


The Trap of Empathy

by hobbitdragon



Category: Dishonored (Video Games)
Genre: Alexandria is doing her best to integrate her time as Grim Alex, Anal Sex, Angst with a Happy Ending, Aramis is a cinnamon roll, Aramis' tattoos, Bisexual Male Character, Biting, Choking, Communication, Corvo being creepy and believing it's normal, Corvo is very quiet but not mute, Dirty Talk, Dubious Consent, F/M, Face-Sitting, Fake/Pretend Relationship, Father-Daughter Relationship, Femdom, Fingerfucking, Foot Jobs, Hand Jobs, Light Bondage, M/M, Oral Sex, Paranoia, Polyamory, Post-Dishonored 2 (Video Game), Sparring, Suicidal Thoughts, Unreliable Narrator, at least briefly - Freeform, because of all his trauma, some small diversions from canon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-05-12
Updated: 2018-08-28
Packaged: 2019-05-05 15:20:46
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 52,307
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14621493
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/hobbitdragon/pseuds/hobbitdragon
Summary: Forced into retirement by Emily, Corvo returns to Serkonos. He expects the usual plots and intrigue. He doesn't expect to get entangled with both of his generous hosts, Aramis and Alexandria.This fic also known as my rarepair idfic for Corvo, who desperately needs a rest and doesn't allow himself any, plus two of my other favorite characters.





	1. Prologue

Emily had described the wrongness of the house to Corvo, warning him of it at some length. She had assured him that he didn’t _have_ to stay with Stilton, it was just that Emily was fond of both Stilton and Hypatia, and Hypatia lived with Stilton these days, and Emily wished to hear Corvo’s account of them both. Perhaps he could visit just for a week, she said, long enough to get to know them a little but brief enough that the qualities of the house itself would not get to him. After that, Corvo could buy himself a house, perhaps, or live in the Clockwork Mansion if he wanted more interest from his living space. So she had written Corvo a letter of introduction to Stilton, and the master of the house had met Corvo at the docks.

Corvo did not see that it mattered where he left his belongings and slept for a few hours every night. His own daughter had forced him out of Dunwall, so a cursed house would be just as good as a mechanical one for the purpose of containing him in his exile.

Admittedly, there was a kind of....sensation, as Corvo passed the threshold. A tingle on his skin, like the static electricity Sokolov had once generated to demonstrate its effects to Emily when she’d been small. But not as though Corvo’s flesh were charged by invisible forces; more as though the house itself were. As if, were he to touch it, it would touch him back.

As Stilton ushered Corvo through the hallways, Corvo counted windows, doors, vents, and crawlspaces in anticipation of meeting the household’s natural philosopher. He thought about the declining state of his joints, and what he’d do if this went poorly. Emily had faith in the recovery of the former Crown Killer, but Corvo knew better than to trust in anyone who’d had a taste for blood and death and had supposedly recovered. Killing once made it so much easier to kill again. (Daud had bled so beautifully, all the brutal strength of his limbs gone soft and yielding in his final moments. Corvo had watched the light leave his eyes, and had remembered the same moment with Jessamine. Corvo had known then it wouldn’t be _his_ last kill, either.)

Sokolov, Joplin, and Jindosh all shared a certain strangeness, even accounting for Jindosh’s altered mental state now. Given the sample of the Academy’s students Corvo had met so far, it seemed reasonable to wonder if time in the Academy altered its attendees in some fundamental way, making them perverse and bizarre. Too much emphasis on vivisection, not enough on human compassion, perhaps. Corvo had no reason to expect Hypatia would be any less aberrant. Dosed with serum or not, the Crown Killer must have gotten her proclivities from somewhere.

So when Corvo walked into the airy workshop, with its racks of glass bottles and trays of scalpels and burners of bubbling fluids, he wasn’t altogether surprised by the figure bent over a notebook and scribbling busily. Hypatia stood taller than most women, with broad, muscular shoulders and hard thighs. Her brown hair was shot through with grey, the olive skin of her hands marked with little glistening scars. If one looked past the unassuming, drab clothes of navy and brown, her body gave her away.

“Drea? Our guest has arrived.”

The woman straightened, setting down her pencil. As she turned and the afternoon light caught her face, her eyes flashed bright and golden, pupils invisible under the shine. Her piercing stare skewered Corvo, raking up and down his body like claws, and her nostrils flared as she inhaled.

Then she smiled, a genial, awkward smile that spoke of some embarrassment he wasn’t privy to. She held out her hand, jerking it up toward him like a badly made clockwork contraption and dropping her gaze. She seemed to shrink somehow, though Corvo could not have said why he thought so. When he took her hand, her grip was at first limp, but then it tightened as though Corvo’s bones were no more than putty between her fingers. Sweat broke out along Corvo’s hairline, prickling and hot.

“I’m so happy to meet Emily’s father. She looks so much like you--she has your eyes, and your mouth,” Hypatia remarked. But then her face fell, and she glanced sideways at Aramis. “Or am I not supposed to mention that? I beg your pardon. I had hoped to make a good impression on someone close to the young woman who saved my life.”

Uncertain of what to do with himself, Corvo tucked his hands (one of them throbbing from the handshake) behind his back, falling into parade rest. Would she fill the silence, as most people felt compelled to do when he didn’t speak? He hoped she would. People revealed so much of themselves that way.

Privately, his own mind raced. Everyone said Emily looked like her mother, and few had ever remarked upon Emily’s likeness to him. He thought he could see a little of himself in her sometimes, but often he could not. It was as if this strange woman had reached right into him and pulled out a secret like Jessamine’s heart of old. Pleasure and pride swelled in him at the same time as a feeling of danger crawled down his spine, and silence stretched out in the workroom, filled only with the sharp, astringent smells of the chemicals. She shifted from foot to foot, then leaned back against the counter, looking at her own feet.

“Alexandria recently completed a new formulation for her curative mixture known as the Addermire Solution,” Stilton interjected, rescuing Corvo and Hypatia from themselves. “It’s been showing promise in curing lung problems among the silver miners, and preventing bloodfly fever as well. Certainly fixed up my dodgy old lungs when she had me try some last week.”

Her look of shy gratitude at the compliment would have been endearing if all the hairs on Corvo’s forearms weren’t standing up. It had been the first version of this serum which had created the Crown Killer, hadn’t it? And now Stilton had tried it too.

“If anything ails you, you might give it a try,” Hypatia offered to Corvo, her tone tentative. Corvo shook his head, looking at the windows. Only second storey, and while the ceilings were of a generous height, falling from this level would hurt but wouldn’t kill him. Probably. Unless he landed wrong. “You have such an interesting bearing, somewhere between military and that of a dancer. But I assume your joints must pain you. I would love to see you walk sometime, gait says so much about a person.”

At this, Corvo stared at her earnest face as her eyes traced his body once more. Was this meant as flirtation? Emily hadn’t mentioned this--but then, Emily was a young woman, so maybe she’d never encountered it. Hypatia looked back at Corvo, expression faltering as she realized she’d crossed another boundary. Then her face cleared, relaxing into something almost blank, and she drew in a deep breath through her nose.

“I am very pleased to meet you, and I look forward to eating with you, Lord Attano. I will be at dinner tonight. For now, I should return to my work. My latest batch of the Addermire solution will finish distilling soon.”

Corvo gave her a shallow bow, and let Stilton lead him out. When they were beyond earshot, Stilton chuckled, shaking his head.

“She can be a bit awkward sometimes. I think genius doesn’t always extend to knowing the finer points of social interaction. But she’s a kind soul, and recovering well from what the Duke did to her. She does hours and hours of unpaid work every week with the miners and their families. I wish we’d had someone like her back when I worked the mines.”

Corvo inclined his head in acknowledgement of the words, and Stilton began discussing Hypatia’s work in the district. It wasn’t as if Hypatia needed payment anyway, Corvo thought, if her room and board and materials were all being supplied by Stilton. And all his money came from the miners anyway. Didn’t that take the generosity out of it all?

One thing Corvo knew for certain: tonight he would be doing a much more thorough exploration of the house.

**

Dinner that evening was less like the formal affairs of the upper class and more like the family dinners Corvo distantly remembered from childhood, when his father, mother, and older sister had all lived together in their small apartment. Perhaps it was the district itself that evoked the memory; the last time he’d been here, he had been sixteen. His actual childhood home was a few minutes’ walk away, and he had passed through familiar parts of the district on his way here after visiting Jindosh.

Emily had set Jindosh up with a caretaker and a cook in a small apartment in the Leyenda District, and apparently Hypatia herself looked in on him every few weeks. From the letters Hypatia wrote to Emily, it seemed that Jindosh might, if allowed time, recover some degree of his intellect. Corvo didn’t know how to judge the truth of that. The man he’d met yesterday had been scattered and unselfconscious about it, with a room full of haphazard drawings, dead creatures in jars, and useless garbage he’d picked up in the street. Pebbles and twine and fish scales and brightly-colored corners of advertisements torn off the public walls, all jumbled together in boxes and across the counters. Jindosh’s recovery was another possibility for Corvo to keep his eye on, for as long as Emily made him stay down here.

Stilton and Hypatia--though both had asked him to use less formal names, Aramis and Drea--maintained most of the mealtime conversations, at first discussing a mutual acquaintance named Lucia Pastor. Corvo noted the name, making a mental note to investigate the woman if she was so closely connected to them both. Apparently Alexandria ran her free clinic just across the street in a space provided by Pastor, treating the mining families and anyone else able to come to Batista District.

From there, the conversation turned to descriptions of some of the week’s patients. Aramis asked pointed questions about the effects of some mask he’d recently reworked and Drea had improved.

And then finally, Aramis turned to Corvo himself.

“Your daughter tells me you’re a quiet man and warned me not to try to get you to talk if you weren’t in the mood, so I’ll try not to pester you. But the quiet men I’ve known often enjoyed listening to others. Is that the case for you?”

Blinking, Corvo stared between his two tablemates. Both looked back at him with polite but earnest interest, genuinely waiting on his answer. And it was exactly the sort of question a nobleman would never ask--frank and unpretending, no courtly dissembling or intrigue. It was foolish to think well of anyone Corvo hadn’t thoroughly surveilled, but against his better judgment, Corvo found himself liking Aramis more for asking.

So Corvo nodded, and the others nodded back, and then they continued their own conversations with occasional pauses to explain things to Corvo which he might not know.

It was the best dinner Corvo had spent with anyone other than Emily in years.

**

That night, Corvo waited till the early hours, when the manor lay as dormant as a household this size would ever get. He let his eyes adjust to the dark, carried a lighter in his pocket, put on his specially-made shoes, and made his way to the place upstairs, where the wrongness concentrated itself almost into a soup, making the very air feel thick and unbreathable. He had been directed by Stilton to avoid this place for his own health, as the servants did, and the doorway had even been bricked off. But Corvo could feel whatever was inside pulling at him, drawing upon his skin like he was a liquid that could seep into a hole in the world.

It felt like being in the Outsider’s presence. He remembered those black eyes with a sick pang, and stood for several long seconds with his hands upon the cold surface of the wall where a doorway used to be.

Then he turned away, going to Stilton’s office. Corvo liked to believe that his capacity for stealth hadn’t changed just because he’d lost his Mark, and he moved on silent feet.

It took very little effort to find Stilton’s accounting books, written out in a clear if unpolished hand. That Stilton didn’t just hire an accountant was another mark in his favor--the more one trusted to others, the more capacity there was for betrayal and manipulation. The books rendered up several names and other avenues to explore at a later date, people to whom Stilton had given large sums of money, or who had paid Aramis large sums. Each line had a note of what the payment was, but sometimes the descriptions were opaque. One simply read “Goods and services” and another “community improvement.” Were these for tradesmen? Charities? Illicit lovers? Blackmailers? All things Corvo needed to know if this was someone his daughter trusted--or if he were to stay here any length of time.

A secret compartment in the desk revealed prurient letters written to Stilton by men in several distinct hands, though of course they bore no names or even initials on them. All those marked with dates were from more than a year ago, however. Corvo wondered what had happened to curtail further letters.

Emily had already told Corvo about Stilton’s longstanding affair with Duke Theodanis Abele, so discovering there had been other men in the years since--at least briefly and via letters--just evoked a sense of mild approval that Aramis had allowed himself this small pleasure. Unwise to keep the letters once read, but the compartment _had_ been difficult to find for anyone unversed in such things.

Corvo had hoped to find the letters Emily herself had written to Stilton, but if Stilton had kept those, they weren’t in any obvious place within the office. She had not allowed him to read any of that correspondence, neither to nor from, and Corvo very much wanted to know what else Emily had said and why. And how Stilton had replied.

From the office, Corvo made his way with even greater care to Hypatia’s workshop. Natural philosophers often kept odd hours, so he knew he ran the risk of running into her here no matter the time. Luck was on his side for once, though, and the laboratory was silent and dim.

If Hypatia kept any filing system other than merely throwing her papers into piles and trying to keep them away from open flames, the system escaped Corvo. So he memorized the positions of everything before picking it up, and tried to return them to their exact haphazard positions once he’d glanced over the work. The equations, ingredient lists, and hosts of paper covered in barely-legible scribbles meant little to him, which in turn meant Hypatia could conceal almost anything in the mess without Corvo knowing enough to be able to tell what he was seeing. Were these recipes for the original disastrous serum that had created the Crown Killer? Were they innocuous notes about the contents of cough syrups and fever reducers? Coded communications to or from someone dangerous? Interspersed in everything were several letters from outside parties, including requests for aid throughout Karnaca. They seemed legitimate, but who knew? Secret meanings could be hidden in the most prosaic of words.

All Corvo could do was make note of names and patterns, and hope to be able to intervene if something wrong arose.

**

At lunch the next day, Hypatia’s eyes followed him around the room. Corvo couldn’t help but wonder if she somehow knew he had been through her things--had he left something out of place, or dropped a few of his own shorter grey hairs where she might have seen them?

But he merely met her gaze and raised his eyebrows in silent question, as though perplexed by her stare.

**

After a week had passed and Corvo had begun his intelligence-gathering in earnest, Corvo settled into the idea that, if there were something nefarious going on with either Hypatia or Aramis, then they were skilful enough to make it so subtle even Corvo couldn’t find obvious traces. 

Seated in Aramis’ workshop and holding a book Corvo was ostensibly reading, Corvo instead watched the other man work. Aramis must have noticed Corvo’s disregard for literature, because Aramis helpfully narrated what he was doing.

“Lucia tells me that the masks work well most of the time, but there are always improvements to be made. They don’t always seal around the cheeks and jaw. Making the mask airtight on the skin--especially if the wearer has facial hair!--is proving difficult. It’s worse still with rubber prices being what they are now. When Luca’s father was alive, the rubber tree plantations were run well. But like everything else, Luca’s mismanagement has caused problems.”

Then Aramis sighed, setting down the mask he was working on and capping the little jar of glue with which he’d been attaching his latest design for the rubber rim. He’d tried sewing the rim into the leather on another mask, and now he was using adhesive to see if it provided a better seal. Aramis glanced around the room, as though checking to make sure no one was listening.

No one but Corvo was--he had already surreptitiously checked all the exits and windows, and been listening carefully for signs of movement in the ducts or hallways. He longed for his lost ability to see through walls, but short of that, he was as sure of their privacy as he could be. Aramis didn’t know that, however, so he flicked on the nearby belt sander and let it fill the room with a concealing din.

“I feel terrible every time I acknowledge it, but I am glad of....what happened with Luca six months ago.” A bland euphemism for what Emily had done: deposing the actual Luca Abele, putting his body double Armando in his place, and the next day kidnapping Luca himself from the guards and running him through Jindosh’s electricity machine. It had rendered Luca every bit as babbling and disjointed as Armando’s claims of ‘the body-double’s madness’ could require. Hypatia herself had attended to Luca’s health for a while, alongside Jindosh’s. “Theodanis would have been crushed by all this,” Aramis admitted, only just loud enough for Corvo himself to hear. “And even more crushed by my part in it. Theodanis loved his sons despite their many failings, and it broke his heart when Radanis was killed. Theodanis knew Radanis and Luca weren’t good men, but the death took away any chance that Radanis might change or grow. And now that has been taken from his brother, too.” Aramis heaved a sigh, eyes traveling the wall as if searching for something. “Yet I cannot even find it in myself to regret what happened. Luca was such a terrible man, and caused so much harm to so many. And....the person in his place is every bit the son Theodanis wished he had.”

Corvo thought about this for some moments, rolling possibilities around in his head. Volunteering information was anathema to him in general, but sometimes one had to offer a little to get more in return.

“During the time of the rat plague,” Corvo began, thinking to test the waters, “I did many things I knew Jessamine would disapprove of, had she been alive. But her death was exactly the problem.”

Aramis lifted his head to look around at Corvo, brows lifting in surprise. After a moment, though, when it became clear Corvo would say nothing more, Aramis nodded, and turned to run his finger along the edge of the mask, forehead wrinkling up.

“Yes, that has been the problem for both of us, hasn’t it? That they died, and left us to sort out what came after.” He dropped his hands to the worktable, fiddling with something else. He clearly had something further he wished to say, and Corvo was very good at waiting people out as they searched for words. So he sat and allowed Aramis to fuss.

The rest of it came out in a halting tone, one of Aramis’ legs shifting back and forth. “It must have been hard for you, after Jessamine died. Not just because of the obvious, imprisonment and all that, but....losing a lover, and not being being able to tell anyone what she’d been to you. I, uh. Imagine it must have been terrible.”

Aramis definitely expected an answer to this, but Corvo had no desire to give him one. He had meant his disclosure to prompt Aramis to speak more about himself, rather than as a request for further conversation. But perhaps this _was_ Aramis opening up as much as he dared--it was dangerous for any man to admit he had slept with another man, and vastly moreso when that man had been the former Duke of Serkonos. How _could_ Aramis disclose it to anyone, much less the man known throughout the Isles as the former Lord Protector and Spymaster? Corvo did not care who Aramis had loved, of course, but Aramis didn’t know that.

Being common-born and the dirty, ruinous secret of someone so far above them in station was a tremendous thing to have in common. It had occurred to Corvo long before but he’d felt no need to bring it up. It was enough to simply know the commonality was there. Besides, if he mentioned it, he would have to disclose what he knew about Aramis and how, which might anger the man. Corvo had no desire to make an enemy of Emily’s friend.

Empathy was a trap, Corvo knew. It drew people into closeness when they ought to have caution, broke down walls which existed for good reason. Corvo could not say he regretted his relationship with Jessamine, but it had been a terrible idea. In the years since the assassination, Corvo hadn’t allowed himself to fall into any further entrapments.

Damned if it wasn’t a tempting pitfall all the same.

So for a lingering silence, Aramis waited for an answer, until finally he looked up at Corvo. Meeting his eyes with practiced calm, Corvo nodded, and Aramis visibly relaxed. Corvo could give Aramis this much, this level of recognition of common experience, whether Aramis acknowledged it as shared or not.

**

Further digging into the affairs of Aramis and Hypatia revealed no unmanageable concerns. A former lover in the Grand Guard had attempted to blackmail Aramis several months before, and Corvo couldn’t find any obvious evidence of what had come of the situation, which might mean Aramis had paid the man off and continued to do so. (Which probably also explained the cessation of erotic letters, if Aramis had grown more cautious.) But a visit to the nearby district where the man worked his night shifts, coupled with the threat to slowly castrate him if he should continue to harass Aramis, resolved the situation to Corvo’s satisfaction. A vaguely-worded apology letter from the man showed up in Aramis’ study two days later, and Aramis looked happier over the breakfast table the next day.

Hypatia’s letters and notes continued to be impossible to interpret, and even examination of her personal rooms when she was out seeing clients revealed nothing more. She appeared to be what Emily said: a good-hearted doctor who had succumbed to the effects of poison before being cured.

But she was by turns awkward and incisive, perceptive and yet ignorant of anything outside her laboratory and clinic, and she wavered unpredictably between these extremes. It was not beyond the expected strangeness of a graduate of the Academy, and yet Corvo had to wonder: how much of her personality now was traces of the Crown Killer? The killings had spanned three years. And three years of such brutal violence, however intermittent, was a very, very long time indeed.

Hypatia never drank or smoked, perhaps out of a desire to avoid anything which might alter her perceptions again. She avoided meat, too, preferring vegetables, grains, and eggs. (Did the taste of flesh evoke too much in her?) And she took no lovers, either. Letters he found underneath her bed suggested she had conducted an affair with her assistant at Addermire, but Corvo had not been able to discover what had happened to him. 

Half of Corvo thought he was being a fool to even consider the doctor a danger, the other half warned that he’d regret it if he didn’t investigate further and then Hypatia ate them all.

So Corvo maintained his silent patrols and did what he could from his comfortable position in the manor. He watched the fireplaces for the kind of ash that resulted from burning papers. He watched the secret stashes where Aramis and Hypatia kept their private things, waiting for anything truly untoward to appear. He watched their body language and word choices. He watched the people who came and went, and the people they met with outside the manor, and looked for any sign of anything amiss.

And he let himself be watched in return, by both of them.

Hypatia spoke little to Corvo, but her eyes followed him with the hungry patience of a cat. Corvo remembered running through walls and pipes in a rat’s body, remembered being tiny and vulnerable, and did not let down his guard. From Hypatia, the watching might mean anything. That she wished to strip his flesh from his bones and suck the marrow from their centers. That she wished to bed or wed him. That she knew he’d visited her rooms when she was gone and didn’t like or trust him as a result. That he was the Royal Protector of both legend and infamy, and she was interested in his past but too polite to ask. That she had a doctor’s eye and had detected the slight limp he could no longer suppress as the pain in his joints worsened by the day, age at last catching up with him now the strength and resilience the Mark had given him was gone.

Aramis, at least, had clearer motives. Aramis was subtle with his interest, never aggressive or overt. His compliments were warm but not presumptuous, his gaze lingering but not overt, his casual touches consistent but no lengthier or differently placed than was allowable between any Serkonan men on good terms. If Corvo had not known of Aramis’ inclinations, the behavior might have implied nothing to him. But he had followed Aramis several times on business tasks (to speak to his banker and the mine foremen and other such persons) and Corvo had watched him with other men. Aramis had exhibited none of the same attentiveness toward anyone else.

So Corvo waited to see what would happen. All things revealed themselves or died with time. He wrote his falsely cheerful letters to Emily, and tried not to beg her to let him return to Dunwall. He read the reports from his replacement, and tried not to berate them for not being him. He paid a few urchins to pass information to him. He visited Luca and Jindosh, he monitored the behavior of the Overseers and the Howlers, and got permission to visit and clear out the last remaining possessions from his childhood home. He refused to weep or scream when he found his Blade Verbena trophy stashed in his mother’s secret place in the wall, and refused to think of how different his life would have been had he simply not participated in that competition.

Most of all, Corvo tried not to let the slow, aimless life of his retirement in Karnaca drive him mad.


	2. Aramis

Corvo couldn’t stop thinking about Aramis’ tattoo.

The letters on the left side of his neck always just peeked over the top of his shirt collars, never quite rising high enough to see in their entirety. Corvo could read “Deep” but that was all. Deep _what?_ There was no account of the inkwork anywhere in Aramis’ personal documents, so Corvo could only guess at the rest of the thing.

Tattoos weren’t a habit of respectable upwardly-mobile men, so they were clearly relics of Aramis’ younger years when he worked in the mines rather than owning them. This theory was borne out by the way the lines had blurred and lightened. The Outsider’s Mark had never faded, remaining sharp, stark, and deep-sea black until the day Delilah had removed it, whereas Aramis’ tattoos had softened with age like the rest of him.

Some people got tattoos purely for aesthetic reasons, but often, Corvo knew, people designed them with personal meaning. Aramis didn’t strike Corvo as a superficial man (though undoubtedly his younger self had been, dazzled by his high-born lover and desperate to fit in with the man’s noble peers) so perhaps the tattoo _had_ been purely about looks.

But what if it was something very personal, that would reveal something significant about its owner? And given what Corvo knew of the sorts of people who got tattoos, if Aramis had one then he likely had more. But if other such marks existed, they lay hidden under Aramis’ clothes like some sort of private gallery. Were they small, individual pieces, each a fully-contained thought? Or were there larger pieces such as those Corvo had seen on men from Wei-Ghon, that spanned the full length of an arm or a leg?

It bothered Corvo that such information was inaccessible to him. But one evening, tucked away together in Aramis’ study and drinking a fragrant vintage while Aramis commented upon and read aloud from the evening newspaper, it occurred to Corvo that he could just ask. The man was attracted to him, after all; perhaps that attraction might encourage Aramis to show himself off if given a reason to do so.

“What does your tattoo say?” Corvo asked in a lull between articles. Aramis blinked, raising a questioning eyebrow at Corvo as he lay the paper down on his lap. The question _had_ been a bit of a non-sequitur, and people were often surprised on the rare occasions Corvo spoke.

But then Aramis smiled, deepening the lines around his mouth and eyes. “The one on my neck, you mean.”

Corvo nodded, pleased by implication that he was right and there were others.

“That one says ‘Deep Down.’ And the symbol above it was the trade mark of the company which originally owned the mines, twenty years ago. I didn’t keep it when I bought them out.”

Exactly as Corvo had suspected, a relic of Aramis’ days spent down in the dark, doing backbreaking labor. “‘That one’?” Corvo prompted, pushing for further disclosure. “You have more?”

Aramis laughed, cheeks pinked by the alcohol. “Oh yes, I have more. I’m not done up wrists-to-ankles like some men I’ve known, but I have a good few.”

Corvo lifted his eyebrows in silent question, and Aramis folded the paper up with a few quick strokes and set it aside.

“I could show you, if you like,” Aramis offered. Some men might have leaned forward, waggled their eyebrows or made the offer clearly salacious. But Aramis proposed disrobing the same as he might propose that they take lunch on the balcony above the back garden on a fine day, with his usual earnest politeness.

So Corvo wasn’t sure if the offer implied something else or not. Under his own shirt-collar, Corvo’s pulse increased, making him a little too warm. Then he nodded, curiosity getting the better of him.

The corners of Aramis’ mouth turned up again, and he nodded as if to himself before pulling open his tie and beginning on the buttons underneath. Corvo had thought he might stop a few buttons down, just far enough to reveal the tattoo on his throat, but Aramis continued right down, pulling his shirt-tails out of his trousers and shucking his jacket. Soon enough, he sat shirtless, bare to the waist, and Corvo took another mouthful of wine to fortify himself. Maybe Aramis noticed, because his face went soft.

“Been a long time since I got to show anyone these. Here,” he began, pointing at his right shoulder, closest to Corvo, “The Morgengaard royal crest--which I guess you probably know, you must have spoken to them as part of your work. I haven’t been back to Morley in years, but I still keep up on the doings of the royal family, like many of my fellow immigrants here in Karnaca.” Oh, the things Corvo could tell Aramis about the Morgengaards--but that was a conversation for another time, if ever.

Aramis’ index finger moved down to where a line of beautiful calligraphy formed what was clearly a copy of a personal signature--that of Theodanis Abele. “Got this the day after his passing. He meant a lot to me, and I still had so many of his letters lying around. I took one right down to the artist and had him copy out the name, and I cried the whole time I sat for it. Artist didn’t make fun of me at least, because everyone in the district knew Theodanis and I were close, and the whole country was grieving too.”

Silently, Corvo thought that Theodanis Abele must have found the first tattoo ironic; his lover marked with the royal crest of a family that wasn’t his. But then Aramis had gone and fixed it by putting Theodanis’ own signature onto his body just below that crest.

Corvo tried not to notice the way the lamp-light glittered on the fine golden wisps of hair along Aramis’ muscular forearms, but the black lines of another tattoo made them so obvious they were hard to miss. This tattoo was of what looked to be the tracks of a mine cart, winding around and around the forearm.

“Think you can guess what this is. Doubt you’ve ever been in a mine, but you grow to depend on the carts. Some parts of the mines you can only get to by electric cart, miles deep into the mountainside. Others you can only get to by elevator.”

At this, Aramis brought his other arm around, showing the matching tattoo on his left arm--this time of what looked like an iron cage, its door standing open.

“I hated those elevators. One of the first things I redesigned when I had enough shares in the mines to have control. When I worked in them, the elevators we had creaked and swayed, lowered down into the dark on thick cables. Sometimes the mechanisms broke and killed men, and sometimes they left us trapped down there overnight, or even for days. And it got so cold! There was nothing better than getting to the top of the elevator shaft and stepping out the gate onto solid ground again, and then out into sunlight.”

Aramis had to turn his body and scoot closer to Corvo to show him the next one, and their knees bumped and then stayed together. This time Aramis’ hand moved up his left arm, pointing to two lines of thick, stylized text: THE EYES ARE NEVER TIRED OF SEEING. The edges of this one were especially fuzzed with age, bleeding into the pale skin around it.

“From the first stricture,” Aramis explained, as though Corvo didn’t know the quote by heart like almost everyone else in the Isles. At this, though, Aramis’ jaw tensed, and he paused. “This one is harder to explain. Perhaps another time.”

Corvo immediately wanted to know what it meant, but he’d gotten Aramis this far. He supposed the explanation would come in its own time.

The next tattoo was another piece of stylized text looped across the left side of Aramis’ ribcage, below his chest: Emma Pearl.

“The name of the ship I came on, from Morley to here,” Aramis murmured. “Awful, and I hate remembering, but it brought me here. People died, disease spread like wildfire and there was no doctor and little food. And I was alone without my family, only just thirteen. I spent that month-long trip thinking that every day I woke up would be the day I died.” Aramis sighed. “I think sometimes about what it would have been like to have someone like Drea waiting for us in Karnaca. How different that would have been.”

Corvo nodded. His own trip to Dunwall had been nothing like that, a big ship with plenty of space in its berths. He’d only been a little seasick. But then, he had been an expensive gift from a young Theodanis to Euhorn Kaldwin; Corvo had been expected to arrive in good condition. He had been proof that Serkonos was nothing like Morley (full of sedition and rebellion), and would instead send one of its best fighters to work in the Empire’s service. Ironic now that Serkonos had ended up the birthplace of a successful coup. Luca really had turned all his father’s actions on their heads.

At the next tattoo, this one on the right side of his ribs, Aramis smiled, but Corvo took a long swallow of wine to calm himself. It was a stylized rendition of Corvo’s own skull mask, which Emily had taken with her to the south and worn during her time in Karnaca. The mask itself lay upstairs, carefully concealed in Corvo’s room. This tattoo was crisp, clearly done recently.

“A memorium of meeting your daughter and helping her do what she did here,” Aramis murmured. “First tattoo I’ve gotten in some time. Knowing you now, I can see so much of you in her. You raised an amazing young woman.”

Nodding in breathless agreement, Corvo couldn’t take his eyes off the tattoo, spreading out on Aramis’ side. Beside it was another piece, though, smaller; a sigil of some sort Corvo thought looked familiar but which he couldn’t quite place.

“Got Emily to draw this for me,” Aramis explained, “from her memory.” He dropped his volume to the barest whisper and looked into Corvo’s face. “It’s the pin they took from Luca, on his last night.”

Aramis didn’t have to say more to indicate that he meant Luca’s last night as Duke of Serkonos. An understated memorial to the second lost son of the man Aramis had loved, and Aramis’ guilt for his own involvement.

Around Aramis’ navel was a wreath of pomegranate flowers and fruits.

“I’d never eaten a pomegranate before coming here,” Aramis explained, “and I associate them with Karnaca. Up in Sirocco, there are stands of pomegranate trees in the parks. In fall and winter, on the days I wasn’t working in the mines, I’d walk up there and pick them to bring home to eat. The taste of them still reminds me of those first years in the city.”

At this, Aramis looked Corvo in the eye, and he realized again just how close they were sitting, and how shirtless Aramis was. Perhaps Aramis realized it too, because he boldly took Corvo’s wine glass from his hand, not dropping the stare, and took a sip before giving it back to Corvo.

The air in the room changed.

When Aramis leaned in to kiss Corvo, breath fragrant with wine and hot on Corvo’s cheek, Corvo thought, _Ah, so this is how it all goes wrong._ Their mouths met, soft and surprisingly tentative given that they’d both been drinking, and Corvo recalled the number of doors in the room, the hallways they led to, the layout of the building. He opened his lips just enough to draw one of Aramis’ in to be touched with a careful tongue, and considered whether any of his belongings in his room were worth saving if he had to escape quickly. Thrilling at the way Aramis leaned closer to him on the fine divan, Corvo decided he could buy new clothes, those were acceptable losses. The bone charms were irreplaceable, but he wore the most necessary ones on his person at all times, and he had stashed the others in a secret location outside the grounds for just such an eventuality.

Aramis’ hand was gentle on Corvo’s jaw, fingers smooth-skinned from so many years as a mine owner rather than a mine worker. The pad of his thumb slipped over Corvo’s stubble to come to rest on the little nub of cartilage guarding the entrance to his ear. Using the need to set down his glass as an excuse, Corvo reached his hand out to the side-table to rid himself of the fine crystalware, and on the return trip checked for the continued weight of his sword at his belt. The reassuring press of it against his fingers emboldened him, so Corvo pushed Aramis back, clambering into his lap and rewarding his warm smile with another kiss. Corvo’s knees protested the position, but when wasn’t he in pain these days? A little more would make no real difference.

Would Aramis tell Corvo to get out as soon as the deed was done? Or would he wish for a longer dalliance, extending the exchange to a week, or even a month? How long before this destroyed their easy companionship, or was that already gone? How long until Corvo’s bad luck drew disaster to their door?

When the inevitable occurred and Aramis grew tired of or disgusted by Corvo, perhaps Emily would feel enough pity to let Corvo visit before his intended return in six months for her wedding. Or maybe if he bragged about a liaison in his next letter, she might believe him rested enough to return? If she let him come back, he could counsel the official Spymaster and Royal Protector. He didn’t have to be formally appointed to continue to do his job.

Corvo sucked the other man’s tongue, avidly consuming the groan this earned him. His own heart thrummed at the stiffening shape pressing against the inside of his thigh, the solid realness of that arousal and the man connected to it. It had been so, so long since Jessamine, and longer still since the people before her. Before Jessamine’s death, he’d had no need to look to others, and after, he had feared distraction. After a few years, he had grown used to his loneliness, and even begun to prefer it. But what did that matter now? His own daughter was so disillusioned by his failure that she had forced him into retirement. If he was distracted now, he could hardly fail her worse than he already had.

Aramis’s hands wandered from their tentative resting place on Corvo’s waist to his thighs, and from his thighs to his backside. Corvo encouraged it with a slow roll of his hips, pressing himself still soft into the other man’s belly. If he’d still had the Mark he would have been hard, but now--

The hands lifted from Corvo’s ass to cradle Corvo’s jaw as Aramis withdrew from the kiss, and Corvo immediately blinked his eyes open. The face below his lay relaxed and open, tender mouth curved upward into a smile.

Aramis wasn’t a handsome man, but he had a face Corvo would once have called _kind_ , all its lines shaped by either concern or laughter. Something in it made Corvo want to earn Aramis’ approval and keep it. He knew this wasn’t the way to do that, but what else was retirement for than to make foolish mistakes.

“Come with me to my rooms?” Aramis offered.

Corvo went. With the doors safely locked behind them, Aramis began unfastening his trousers with a kiss and another smile. Corvo followed along with his own clothes, loathe though he was to part with his charms and sword and much as he hated baring his scarred skin. But he couldn’t think of a polite way to leave his clothes on with his host undressed, and he no longer had to keep his hand hidden, so there was no real excuse. Shucking his trousers brought its own rolling wave of embarrassment, as it made obvious Corvo’s own inability to respond. It had almost never been a problem with Jessamine, but he hadn’t even been forty then. Corvo wondered if this would end the encounter before it had even begun, interpreted as a sign of disinterest or hesitance.

Yet Aramis regarded Corvo’s nude figure--with its myriad scars and soft, recalcitrant parts--with a grin of delight. Aramis leaned back on the bed, bracing himself with both hands so the thick muscle of his shoulders bunched up around his neck as his eyes traveled up and down.

“Gorgeous,” Aramis declared. “I’m worried you’ll come to your senses in a minute.”

The expected response to such a compliment was probably to offer bashful thanks, or perhaps to flirt back. But Corvo’s looks had long since ceased to be relevant to him except as a tool. He knew how to fake interest in someone to achieve an unrelated goal, but not to express his own attraction. So he got down on his knees to demonstrate his willingness instead, kneeling between the other man’s thighs and keeping his face carefully blank so he wouldn’t show his doubt and anxiety.

He had been twenty the last time he took a man in his mouth, and looking back he suspected he’d done a poor job of it. But faking his way through situations in court by schooling his face into neutrality and refusing to offer unneeded commentary had served him well (most of the time) and he remembered teaching Jessamine how to pleasure him this way. Perhaps that would be enough, and Aramis wouldn’t know the difference.

Aramis wrapped his hands around the nape of Corvo’s neck, brushing his thumbs over the corners of Corvo’s jaw and granting him another warm smile. “A man of business, I see, and generous. Have you done this before?”

Corvo stilled, wondering what had given away his lack of expertise. Perhaps silence in itself spoke of nervousness to Aramis. But distraction was often better than a straight answer, so Corvo turned his head and took the man’s thumb between his lips, laving it with his tongue in demonstration of what he was offering. Aramis watched him as he explored the nail, and a private smile crept onto his face again. Corvo wondered what it meant. Simple gratitude for the impending sexual favor? Derision at Corvo’s willing debasement of himself? Gloating at having the former Lord Protector here? Aramis didn’t seem the type, but it wouldn’t be the first time Corvo had completely misjudged someone. He had worked beside Burrows for years, and appointed Ramsey himself.

Corvo didn’t like that mysterious expression, so he released the thumb and turned his head to get at his real goal. Before he could do more than lean forward, though, Aramis stopped him with a squeeze to his nape.

“First, you need a pillow to kneel on, this is hardwood.” Once a suitably thick one had been passed down, with Corvo shuffling onto it in surprise, Aramis continued. “Now, start with my purse. One side at a time.”

Relieved not to be asked any further questions, Corvo did as directed. The skin was silky-soft, texture only marred by a few red hairs. And when Corvo dropped his jaw to allow it, each tender gland filled his mouth with pleasing precision, fitting neatly behind his teeth and into the soft warm space atop his tongue. As he nursed at one side and then turned to do the same to the next, he thought of those he’d brought down in fights with a well-aimed blow or stab to this place. He wondered how many men he’d left incapable of siring children. There had even been a few he’d outright castrated, but those memories still turned his stomach even now, so he pushed them away to focus on the warm clean smell of Aramis, still ever so slightly perfumed from his morning bath. Aramis hummed his approval, stroking into the short sensitive hairs at Corvo’s nape and provoking a little shiver Corvo couldn’t suppress.

“Wonderful,” Aramis sighed. “Now the shaft, slowly.”

Aramis’ member made a stark contrast to the rest of him. His torso, arms, and thighs were built blocky and thick, heavy with muscle and a soft padding of fat in the way that Corvo had always liked on other men. But Aramis’ cock stood slender and almost pretty in its nest of coppery curls, with a graceful upward curve that reminded Corvo of certain flowers or architectural motifs. Unlike Corvo’s, its surface wasn’t marred by scars or squirming veins, instead rising in an even pale pink color to the ruddy crown.

Corvo’s mouth watered at the sight of it and its faint, musky smell. If he was going to throw away this friendship, at least Aramis was doing him the service of being tempting enough to almost excuse the mistake.

The ridge on the underside of the shaft was satisfying on Corvo’s tongue, warm and firm after the yielding softness of the loose skin below. Corvo made his way up with his eyes half closed, listening for footsteps down the hall or any sounds other than the slow tick of the bedside clock and the settling of the beautiful house around them. Aramis sighed into the near-silence, the expelled air of it just enough to ruffle the hair on Corvo’s forehead.

Corvo lifted his arm to pull back the foreskin and start on the real event, but a hand left his nape and caught him, lacing their fingers together instead. Corvo turned his eyes up in silent question.

“Just your mouth, _acushla_. I’ll show you how to make it enough.”

 _Acushla_ \--Corvo couldn’t speak any of the languages of Morley, but he had a passable ability to read in every language of the isles, and could understand the spoken basics. He’d never had much use for learning endearments, but he thought _acushla_ meant something like _sweetheart_ or _dear_. A ridiculous term to apply to him, then, but he closed his lips over Aramis anyway. The salty tang of arousal diffused over his palate, and Aramis squeezed at his hand and nape with a grunt of satisfaction. Corvo’s mouthful jumped before relaxing back onto his bottom lip, and an echoing twitch went down Corvo’s spine, balls tightening. When Corvo tried to go further down, however, the grip on his neck firmed and a thumb dug into his shoulder, holding him still.

“Just lick. There’s no rush, we’re not young anymore. Let me feel you.”

Well, if Aramis insisted. Corvo traced around the crown, from the sensitive frenulum up to the flared ridge at the top and back down, enjoying the texture and heft of Aramis as he was enjoyed in return. Pushing under the loose foreskin so it bunched up around his lips, Corvo was pleased when Aramis’ thighs tensed and his belly rose on a sharp inhale.

“Like that, just like that,” Aramis praised. “Then get it wet so your mouth will slide.”

Corvo did as directed, and allowed himself to be pulled down when prompted too. How different this was from his first time with Jessamine! He hadn’t been her first, nor she his, and she’d been reckless with him, all teeth and nails and the wildness of Fugue Feast. He had thought it would be their only time together, a few days of madness and secrecy and then a lifetime of reliving the memories. But this was slow and easy, murmured praise and direction and careful consideration. Corvo missed her still, but he did not miss the anxious guesswork of learning to please her.

When his own arousal swelled against his thigh, it surprised Corvo. But the surprise was distant, masked by the almost meditative pace of the exchange, the tingling of his lips and the gratifying stretch of his jaw. Perhaps if he was hard now, he ought to offer himself in some other way? But Aramis wasn’t a woman, and Corvo found he didn’t wish to move, even though his knees protested the position. The pleasure damped his pain, pushing it to the edges of his consciousness, and he already knew he would pay for this later. There would always be pain and disappointment, but in the meanwhile, there was this.

Aramis never tried to push into his throat, nor thrust so that it choked him. His hips tilted into Corvo’s motions, and his palms sweated on Corvo’s own heated skin, but that was all. And at the end, when Corvo himself had hardened to the point of throbbing and he had to force himself to maintain awareness of his surroundings beyond the warm V of Aramis’ thighs, Aramis warned him.

“Ahh, you’ll make me spend soon, you feel so good--”

Corvo tightened his mouth, pushed up with his tongue, and leaned forward, trying to relax enough to let Aramis nestle into his soft palate. He didn’t like the taste of semen, but he remembered liking the feeling of victory when he made another man come.

Soon enough he had it, Aramis’ fingers digging into the scars on Corvo’s shoulders as he let out a deep rumbling groan. Heat pooled in Corvo’s face and between his thighs, and he wished Aramis were holding his left hand rather than his right so he could stroke himself. He’d taught himself to do many things left-handed, but not this. He swallowed and swallowed, unable to resist cupping his balls at least, cradling them up against himself.

“Good, so good,” Aramis crooned, and then pulled Corvo up off his creaking knees till he lay atop the other man, staring down and wondering where this would to lead.

To kisses, apparently. Aramis didn’t seem to mind the taste of himself in Corvo’s mouth, or perhaps he even enjoyed it. He certainly showed no hesitance in stroking Corvo’s tongue with his own, or squeamishness about the spit on Corvo’s chin.

When Corvo started to rock himself up against Aramis’ belly, however, Aramis moved as if to roll them over. But Corvo stopped them, leaning up and away and wiping his face. Something about the idea of being under another man made the hairs at the back of his neck prickle and the muscles at the base of his belly tense up. He could get down on his knees for a man but the thought of being _under_ one--even had he wished to explain it, he had no words for the voiceless terror of being naked with the guards and the Spymaster and the torturer in Coldridge. Expecting some sort of protest from Aramis, some attempt to cajole or persuade, Corvo wasn’t sure what to make of it when Aramis merely smiled.

“You’re right, the view is better this way. I’d love to have you ride me like this, another time.”

 _Another time_ \--a simple phrase, but the implication of it relaxed Corvo a little more. He wouldn’t be cast out tonight, at least, because Aramis wasn’t a man to make idle promises. So when Aramis wrapped his hand around Corvo where he strained and dripped onto Aramis’ stomach, Corvo let it happen, bracing himself on Aramis’ shoulders. Aramis’ other hand curved down over Corvo’s buttock, pulling him forward and prompting him to thrust into the tight grip.

“There you go, _acushla_. Beautiful, just like that. Damn, look how hard and wet you got. Flattering me in silence, eh?”

The remark surprised a smile out of Corvo. Aramis hadn’t seemed to mind Corvo’s lack of idle chatter over the last month, but it had been a long time since anyone had been comfortable enough with it to joke about it. So Corvo nodded, answering the question he suspected Aramis had: _Yes, I’m attracted to you. I want this._

And the feel of Aramis handling him was a revelation in itself. No one had touched Corvo this way in so long--sixteen years, wasn’t it?--that the way Aramis moved on and under him was startling and new. The yielding flesh of Aramis’ belly under Corvo’s balls, the softening lump of Aramis’ sex nestled between Corvo’s buttocks, the muscle of Aramis’ shoulders under Corvo’s bare palms, and of course the tight ring of Aramis’ hand. Just a hand, but not _Corvo’s_ hand, not his grip nor his pace or gestures. All of it was so curious and exciting and new that Corvo couldn’t help moving into it, drawing himself back and forth through those thick fingers and pushing himself toward his own completion.

Corvo had wondered, sometimes, what it would be like if he still had the Mark and could enter Aramis and walk around in his skin. How would his thicker, shorter body feel from the inside? What pains and limitations did it have, what sensations did it enjoy? It was a line of thought that had often crossed Corvo’s mind since the Outsider had given him the power all those years ago, and he’d worn the flesh of many men and women out of both necessity and curiosity since. But ever since the first inklings that Aramis might find him attractive, the desire to understand Aramis further had burned in Corvo. _You want me, but why?_ Corvo needed to know. What did Aramis want, and what demands might follow if he got it? Walking in his skin couldn’t tell Corvo a man’s thoughts, but it might have offered some vital hint.

How it felt to be possessed, Corvo didn’t know. No one had ever done it to him and he hoped no one ever would. But he wondered, now, if it would feel sudden and overwhelming like climax--a rapid bloom of something foreign inside him. Pain was so familiar, so omnipresent in his life, and pleasure so fleeting and rare. Pleasure changed his body, sharpening some senses and dulling others. As the peak approached he saw and felt nothing but Aramis, the lines around his eyes and the red-gold color of his hair, yet untouched by grey. The whole of Corvo’s mind filled up with touch that had long since grown alien to him, an experience of himself as someone else, someone desirable and able to be touched. As though an outside power had penetrated his mind and diffused something unknown into his limbs.

When he came he couldn’t help the way he convulsed or cried out, but the sound of his own voice startled and disturbed him: rough and deep, like the sound a prisoner might make when struck. The pleasure receded all at once and Corvo dropped back into his body like a displaced host, realizing in a panic that he’d lost track of the rest of the room, the hallways beyond the door, the sounds of the house. What if someone had crept in? What if Aramis had drawn out a knife or a gun? In fear, Corvo stared around the room, limbs shaking and chest heaving for air--if someone meant him harm, this was the perfect time to strike at him.

Several torturous seconds passed before Corvo determined that they were still alone, in Aramis’ closed room, and that both of Aramis’ arms were still visible and holding nothing worse than Corvo himself. Corvo longed for the security of being able to see through walls, longed for the certainty it brought. When Aramis reached up with his clean left hand, Corvo flinched away from it--and then realized what he’d given away in doing so.

He hadn’t changed at all in sixteen years, had he? The scars had mostly flattened and shaded to the same color as the rest of his skin, but they still felt fresh under the surface. Corvo’s knees screamed as he dismounted from the other man and turned away to sit at the edge of the bed.

The covers shifted around Corvo’s thighs as Aramis sat up beside him, but made no gesture to touch.

“First time in a while you’ve slept with someone?” he asked, after a long silence. Corvo nodded, gaze traveling the room. “First time with a man?”

His stare stilled, fixing on the bedside clock. What Corvo felt now was a little like being in the Void again, a simultaneous sense of being outside the flow of time and inside a rushing river of it, aging rapidly and yet neither breathing nor feeling a heartbeat. What did Aramis want to know with such a question? What judgment would result from Corvo’s answer? Given all Corvo knew of Aramis, it was unlikely this encounter would be turned to blackmail; that was not the man’s way, and he was too implicated in it himself.

At last Corvo grew tired of his own conjecture and simply shook his head, admitting that he’d been with other men before. Aramis let out a low hum of acknowledgment, neither positive nor negative.

“I wondered about you, y’know.” Corvo narrowed his eyes, craning his neck to peer at Aramis, who waved the look away with one hand. Then seeming to realize what a mess that hand was, he scooted forward on the bed and pulled open the bedside drawer, withdrawing a pair of kerchiefs to clean himself. “Myself and some of the other inverts I’ve known,” Aramis continued. “Even this far south, the aristocracy buzzed with conjecture that you were the old Empress’ lover and the new Empress’ father. But some people, we wondered about the years and years you spent as a bachelor, and the way you ostentatiously refused all offers of marriage. For some, that was taken as a sign that you might be like us.” Aramis snorted, offering a clean square of linen to Corvo, who took it. Most of the splatter had ended up on Aramis, but Corvo tidied himself and waited for Aramis to finish his line of thought. “Funny, up till tonight I would have said that was incorrect,” Aramis stated. “But I was curious, and hopeful, so I got myself tipsy on purpose with you.” He leaned close, as if his next words were offered in confidence; as if this whole conversation wasn’t about subjects of secrecy and potential danger. “If you’d said no, I would have pretended tomorrow that drink makes me both amorous and _very_ indiscriminate.”

This earned a nod from Corvo; it was to be expected. When he’d been much younger and coming on to a fellow Grand Guardsman, he had used the same excuse.

"So what does it mean to you, that passage from the first stricture?" Corvo asked, meaning to distract them both from his discomfort. And because otherwise, not knowing what that final tattoo was about would bother him like a burr inside his clothes. 

This time, Aramis snorted at the mention of it. 

"I got it when I was very young and still afraid of what it meant to desire men as I do. I meant it was both a warning to myself of the dangers and an admission that I no longer believed I could stop myself from looking even if I never acted on my thoughts. I, ah. Didn't want to tell you before I knew how you'd respond, but it seems clear now that you won't take it amiss."

Corvo nodded, the full stricture running through his mind.  _Restrict the Wandering Gaze that looks hither and yonder for some flashing thing that easily catches a man's fancy in one moment, but brings calamity in the next. For the eyes are never tired of seeing, nor are they quick to spot illusion. A man whose gaze is corrupted is like a warped mirror that has traded beauty for ugliness and ugliness for beauty._

Perhaps the warning of the words still held true, if _Corvo_ had caught Aramis' eye. Corvo knew he looked well enough from across a room, dressed in his fine clothes. He knew that longer acquaintance with him galled most people. Including even Emily, now.

Aramis took a deep breath, drawing air into his barrel chest before letting it out in a gusty sigh. “I don’t suppose you’re interested in spending the night.”

It wasn’t a question, intonation traveling down the scale on the final words. Corvo shook his head anyway. He already knew he wouldn’t sleep after this, and the presence of other bodies in a room where he was trying to rest just reminded him of Coldridge and its constant noises of human suffering and cruelty. But an unfamiliar part of him kicked up a squirm of discomfort at his own flat refusal, so he turned toward the other man and purposefully softened his face.

“I could come back another time,” Corvo offered, echoing Aramis’ earlier words. The look of surprise and satisfaction the sentence earned him almost drowned out Corvo’s immediate self-doubt and recrimination. Almost.

“It’s easy to forget you have a gorgeous voice, too,” Aramis praised, and leaned close to kiss Corvo again. Seated side by side once more, it was like they’d been transported back in time to the couch earlier, and Corvo felt another thrill go through him as though he could start the evening all over again now. As if either of their aging bodies would allow it.

This would go wrong, that much Corvo knew with complete certainty. Aramis would grow tired of him. Or Corvo himself would fail to respond in some vital and desired way and he would be cast out. Or someone would harm them. Whether tonight, or a week from now, or years down the line, everything good was destroyed in the end, every certainty overturned.

But for now, in this house where magic could not intrude, Corvo could almost believe it wouldn’t happen.

**

Corvo found himself back in Aramis’ rooms the next night, mouth chafed to stinging from kisses and hands braced on the headboard. His eyes felt raw in their sockets, sandy from lack of sleep, but what did that matter? Aramis had looked at him so hungrily over lunch and dinner, and if this ended sooner rather than later, Corvo thought he might regret having missed what little he could have.

Aramis kissed each vertebra of Corvo’s spine, though, every contact of his lips carrying him further down the blasted landscape of Corvo’s back. Corvo hadn’t thought himself self-conscious, but it occurred to him now that he hadn’t let anyone examine this side of him in more than a decade, either. No one outside of Coldridge who wasn’t a physician had seen the full extent of the damage. For Aramis to not only see it but put his face so close to it made prickles of unease raise the hairs all over Corvo’s limbs. Much of his body told morbid tales of his history, torture and gunfire and swordfights, but his back in particular was a disgusting sight and Corvo knew it. Aramis wasn’t a pampered nobleman with a body untouched by the world, but even so he could not be used to seeing such things. And he hadn’t spent as much time looking at it before.

Corvo gritted his jaw, focusing on the sounds of the house. The hallways were silent, and all the everyday drama of the neighborhood was filtered out by the enormous windbreak walls surrounding the yards.

Aramis had explained them once, when Corvo had asked--he had initially thought Aramis paranoid, or wondered if he were trying to keep himself separate from the poorer folk among whom he lived. But it turned out that the city had already planned to build a windbrake on the site in an attempt to lessen the impact of the windstorms that blew dust into everything here, and so in order to be permitted to build on this particular spot, Aramis had been forced to agree to the massive walls on all sides of his estate. Corvo had wondered if Theodanis had engineered the whole setup in an attempt to keep his lover safer.

When Aramis reached Corvo’s buttocks, Corvo couldn’t help tensing away from the touch. His backside in particular bore ugly marks--hidden under the fabric of his tailored clothes normally but obvious now without them. Aramis let the small resistance go without commentary, merely turning his head to kiss at Corvo’s hip instead. One of his hands moved up between Corvo’s legs, cupping his balls in the palm and brushing at his opening with the thumb.

“May I?” Aramis asked, and Corvo nodded. At least no one in Coldridge had raped him, so he was undamaged inside. The torturer hadn’t been interested in sex. It had been a small grace in a man otherwise devoid of mercy or conscience. One of the guards had tried early on, of course, but Corvo had killed him before he’d had time to think and the others hadn’t risked it after that. They’d threatened him with it often, and the beatings Corvo had taken for that resistance had been terrible, several of the marks scarring all the way down to the bone of his ribs. But he’d been beaten so many times in that half-year that once more had made no real difference, all the incidents blurring together in his memory. Corvo was proud of the fact that nothing unwanted had ever been inside him.

Aramis pressed yet another kiss to Corvo’s shoulder this time, then leaned sideways to open up the drawer of the nightstand, from which he withdrew a little jar and popped open its lid. But instead of doing this from behind as Corvo had expected, Aramis dropped himself onto the bed to Corvo’s right, smiling up at him from the expensive down pillows as he slicked up his fingers. Corvo blinked down at him as Aramis ran slippery knuckles up the inside of Corvo’s thigh before pressing his fingers flat over the little knot of tense muscle hidden behind Corvo’s balls.

“You’re sure? Not everybody likes this,” Aramis asked. Perhaps he expected Corvo to back down from this. But why shouldn’t Corvo allow himself the pleasure? If Aramis considered it insulting to debase oneself in such a way, then Corvo had probably already lost the man’s respect by getting down on his knees and sucking him. So Corvo nodded again.

Aramis kept his eyes fixed on Corvo’s face as he slid the first finger in. Even that felt big, and Corvo breathed carefully and silently thanked whatever chance had dictated that Aramis’ endowment be so unlike the rest of him. A slender bit like that Corvo could handle comfortably, but more than that might have been too much.

Reverent and cautious, Aramis stroked over Corvo’s flank as if he were a skittish horse who might run away. So Corvo schooled his face into calmness and rocked into the intrusion to remind his body that it wanted this. When Aramis worked in a second finger and curled them both forward to tease at the sensitive spot behind Corvo’s purse, Corvo didn’t have to pretend at pleasure anymore. His cock firmed with each stroke, rising from quiescence to eagerness until it strained forward and hit his belly whenever he twitched. His hands pushed at the headboard till it creaked, and he let out loud, harsh breaths.

Corvo had nearly forgotten the sweet, private pleasure of this, hidden up inside him away from all the obvious things most men wanted touched. By the third finger, Aramis’ face had flushed red, his eyes wide and shining as he watched avidly from below. Perhaps he hadn’t truly expected Corvo to like this. The expression looked like awe, but lust made people strange.

Corvo hoped Aramis had the stamina to last for a while, because he was now eager for it, recklessly pulling Aramis’ hand away and snatching up the jar to move down the bed for the main event. And when half a minute later Corvo seated himself on Aramis’ lap and felt him nestled all the way up inside, Corvo couldn’t help the wolfish grin of satisfaction his face broke into.

Perching atop someone like this brought back good memories. Jessamine had owned toys for her own pleasure, including several phalluses made from polished wood and stone. Several times during her pregnancy, when she had been afraid to let him inside for fear it would somehow harm the baby, she had used silk scarves to bind a phallus to herself and let Corvo climb onto her lap just like this. Sitting on the royal throne, she’d called it, and joked with him that he must be planning usurp her crown since he liked sitting on the throne so much.

Aramis felt nothing like those toys, all warm skin and flexible flesh beneath it, but oh, it was just as good. Corvo found he remembered exactly how to lean back and brace himself on someone’s thighs, angling their bodies so Aramis slid over the sweet spot inside him with every rise and fall of Corvo’s body.

His knees hurt and his left hip ached too, but he could feel that later when he was done being foolish. He would miss this when something inevitably went wrong.

**

The next day Corvo left the house without explanation to follow up on several leads he’d gotten from the account books and Hypatia’s notes. One location turned out to be an herbalist, and clearly Hypatia’s supplier of ingredients. Its proprietor was a harried young woman whose children watched Corvo with big serious eyes as they tidied the store and rang people’s purchases up at the till.

The next lead turned out to be a very fine tobacconist, its owner a handsome middle-aged man who looked Corvo up and down with louche obviousness. Had the man no fear of reprisal at all? The shamelessness of it offended Corvo, as it put them both at risk, but he played along with it and stood too close, met the man’s eyes too long, smiled too readily, and generally invited the man’s attentions. In order to spend longer in the store and ascertain why exactly Aramis had made such a large one-time payment to this establishment--more than could be explained by his smoking habits, which were occasional at best--Corvo purchased a few tins of the white leaf herb he knew Emily and Wyman enjoyed together. Even though white leaf was illegal in Dunwall, no one would dare confiscate such a gift from Corvo to the Empress. And besides, Wyman was so afraid of him that he hoped the gift might soften his image with them even just a little.

But for now, Corvo watched the tobacconist, mind buzzing with possibilities: was this another situation of blackmail? Had Aramis been taken advantage of by this man too?

The tobacconist himself settled the matter of what to do next after glancing at the door to make sure no one else was coming in. He placed Corvo’s change into his palm with entirely too much touching and then took Corvo’s hand in both of his own, stroking over the sensitive skin inside the wrist and leaning in to murmur in Corvo’s ear.

“I hold a social gathering in the back rooms of the shop once a month. The next one is the fifth, this weekend at eight in the evening, and perhaps you would honor us by attending. You might meet some....like-minded individuals. We’re lucky enough to have a wealthy benefactor, so I will be providing refreshments.” And then he winked at Corvo, everything about him screaming innuendo. “If you’re interested, when you arrive, say you came for the whiskey and cigars.”

Corvo extricated himself from the shop and resisted the urge to shake himself. If Aramis was the wealthy benefactor, it might explain the money; it took coin to host almost any gathering, and to clean up afterward, especially where drink was provided. There was no way he could attend to investigate further, as his face was known throughout the Isles and he could not hope to maintain any sort of anonymity. Flirting a little was one thing, but allowing himself to be seen by any number of unknown persons at an event of some secretive nature was another. So Corvo determined to see what he could glean through surveillance.

For the next two nights, he aggressively rode Aramis, half-angry at him for being so trusting as to connect himself with any of the people Corvo had investigated. And the third night, when Aramis offered no intention of going out himself, Corvo left the manor quietly and made his way to the tobacco shop. Yet again he bitterly missed the loss of his Mark when he had to climb a nearby building by hand, unable to simply blink up to its gables. Making himself as comfortable as he could, he settled in to wait with the optics of his mask focused upon the door of the tobacco shop. Its lights were off and its shutters closed, but when someone knocked on the door, it opened to admit them and showed the brief light of a candle held in someone’s hand.

The first surprise was that the event was a mixed-gender one. Men showed up both singly and in pairs, many of them in clothes just a little more colorful or decorative than the norm. But women showed up too, some with close-cropped hair and the particular look that sometimes indicated a woman who wasn’t the marrying sort. Some individuals showed up cloaked with hoods drawn, figures unreadable under the fabric. And one or two brave or foolhardy souls showed up in clothes they would probably not wear in their day-to-day lives--people who might perhaps be like Wyman, for whom Emily kept a secret stash of dresses and lace in the Tower safe-room. Wyman dressed as a man in public because the world demanded it, and because as the future ‘Prince Consort’ of the Empire, their public image had to be impeccable. But here, in this average city street, under the flickering light of a nearby electric lamp, a few possibly-similar individuals had dared to go into the world with their secret on display.

When half an hour had passed with no one new showing up and Corvo had counted thirty-two attendees, he assumed that everyone who would arrive had already entered. No further information could be gleaned tonight without breaking into the building itself to eavesdrop, and while that was well within Corvo’s capabilities, it was not a good tactical choice. If someone caught sight of him entering the premises, he could not cause them any harm, not even with a sleep dart. News of it might reach the shop’s proprietor and the other guests, and then perhaps none of them would feel safe returning. If the shop-owner were blackmailing Aramis, then he might increase his demands in response to an intrusion. If the attendees were blameless and Aramis had given money out of generosity and kindred feeling, then Corvo had no wish to cause harm. The gathering’s purpose was clear enough from those entering, and it was only the exchange of money which remained a mystery.

So Corvo returned to the manor, actually allowing himself to fall into his bed before midnight for once. But his thoughts spun through possibilities for a long time before he finally slept.

**

The next night, with the taste of Aramis still warm in his mouth, Corvo lay himself down beside the other man. Their sweat cooled until Aramis pulled the blankets up around them, and Corvo reminded himself why he shouldn’t try to spend the night here. It felt nice now, but he knew he would not sleep, and his body ached from climbing the buildings yesterday. He needed rest.

After a long, comfortable silence, Aramis cleared his throat and ran a thoughtful palm down Corvo’s midriff.

“There’s been something on my mind, and I wonder if you might just listen for a moment. You’re so good at it, after all.”

Corvo immediately stopped breathing, feeling his pulse ratchet up in pace. But he kept his gaze fixed on the ceiling and nodded, because what else could he do?

“I’m sure you’re aware that the previous Duke and I weren’t just friends,” Aramis began, and Corvo nodded again. It was obvious, but it was the kind of statement that demanded some acknowledgement. One didn’t just casually admit to being the illicit lover of one of the most powerful men in the Isles. “And you are aware that he was married, with children.”

Corvo turned his head, narrowing his eyes at Aramis. Where was this going?

“Maybe it’s too soon to say this, but these days I feel too old to beat around the bush with pretending and guesswork. I was never any good at it to begin with.” He heaved a deep sigh, his barrel chest pushing against Corvo’s shoulder. “So I’ll just say it: I know you’re probably not like me, solely interested in men. And if you wish to carry on with others as well as me--especially women, I am aware there are some things I simply cannot provide--I will not take it amiss.”

Staring wide-eyed at a picture on the wall, Corvo desperately tried to determine what he was meant to say. But all he could think of was telling Jessamine something similar, twenty-seven years ago. He had never asked her for faithfulness, and indeed had not expected it. When she had become pregnant (the first of his many failures to protect her and the empire, though he could not find it in himself to regret creating Emily) he had told Jessamine it would be for the best if she made a hasty marriage to a suitable political match. That she had refused to do so, and instead chosen to withstand the immense scorn and criticism that came with producing a bastard with no named father, had shocked and shaken him. He hadn’t _wanted_ to see her with anyone else, and had in fact hated the idea and dreaded having to extend his protection to a man who would supplant him at Jessamine’s side. But to offer was the right thing to do. During the six months after they well and truly knew she was with child, Corvo had tried so often to change her mind, and it had made him miserable every single time.

So Aramis couldn’t possibly mean what he said.

“If you wish me to stay with you, it would suit me better if you just asked,” Corvo forced out at last. “You don’t need to make concessions to bargain for my attention.”

At this, Aramis pushed himself up onto one arm and looked Corvo in the eye, flattening his other hand across Corvo’s chest. He could probably feel the too-fast thump of Corvo’s heart beneath his breastbone.

“That’s not what I’m doing, _acushla,”_ Aramis replied, in far too gentle a tone. Corvo looked away, judging himself for the weakness it betrayed. “With Theodanis, I spent damn near two decades trying to be everything he wanted, the _perfect_ man for him, and scaring myself with thoughts of what would happen if he wanted anyone other than me. He was a great man and worth the effort, but the idea itself was wrongheaded. No one can be perfect for anyone. He had a wife, and it was fine. He had other lovers now and then, and that was fine too. Because he always came to me for guidance and companionship, and always returned to me. After he passed, I realized how much that really meant. He could have had anyone--and did--and yet he always kept choosing me anyway.”

At this Corvo pulled away, swinging his legs over the side of the bed and lifting his body out of the warm cocoon of the blankets. A fire still crackled in the grate but Corvo shivered. He had never used to get so cold when he was younger.

Behind him, Aramis sat up too. But he apparently refused to take Corvo’s rising as a sign to give up, because Aramis placed his hand flat between Corvo’s shoulder blades, right on top of a ridge of uneven scarring from a wound that had grown infected.

“So if you want others, that’s fine,” Aramis plowed on, as if determined to get it said. “I don’t want you to feel trapped with me.” He bent, lifting his palm to place a kiss to the ugly keloid. Corvo had lost sensation there, but he could feel in the skin around it and knew what Aramis was doing.

Pretty offers Aramis was making, which made Corvo wonder how long it would take until Aramis himself decided to look elsewhere--if he wasn’t already. Perhaps one of the men at the gathering--perhaps the tobacconist himself?--already had Aramis’ attentions too. How many others had spread their legs for Aramis as Corvo did? How many more would do so after this?

“I would like it if you stayed here,” Aramis confessed, as if doing so were an easy thing rather than the equivalent of baring one’s belly to a pack of wild dogs. “In my house, at least, if not in my bed. But if the house doesn’t suit you, or you desire a place of your own, I’d want to see you anyway.  You’re a rare man, Corvo. I could grow attached to you, and I hope you could grow attached to me.”

Corvo’s pulse beat and beat and beat in his throat, blocking off his voice and breath. He could barely think. Aramis’ words were drowning him. He half-hated Aramis for making him say anything. How dare Aramis be so generous! How dare he give until Corvo had to either express gratitude or confess himself too greedy! It would destroy them both someday, Corvo had no doubt. There was no place in the world for gentle people, only those who ate or were eaten.

“I....I might like that,” Corvo whispered at last, the admission gutting him. When Aramis wrapped an arm around Corvo’s shaking belly and pulled him back down onto the mattress, the pressure of the other man’s touch felt like a bandage on a wound, Corvo’s skin too fragile to be exposed to the air.

Which only meant that as soon as he left, the bleeding would start again.


	3. Alexandria

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Content warning: I wrote this with the knowledge that, in the Victorian era, doctors being friends or otherwise having dual relationships with their clients was a commonplace practice. That said, some may find it disturbing that there is some crossover between Alexandria's personal and professional roles in this chapter. 
> 
>  
> 
> ***********  
> FURTHER MUCH MORE SPOILERY CONTENT WARNING: this chapter contains a sexual scene with very dubious consent on both sides, having to do with Grim Alex. It does not lead to 'full sex,' but does involve touching and some kink-type activity. Corvo also has some pretty serious suicidal/self-destructive ideation going on in this chapter. Please mind your needs in reading this.

In the early evening Hypatia knocked on the door to Corvo’s sitting room before letting herself in. Her clothes were untidy and smears of some unnamed substance marred one shoulder of her sweater. Work in the clinic was often unkind to her garments, but normally she changed out of her work clothes before Corvo saw her at dinner. Today, however, the hour had not yet rung for the meal. Corvo stared at her with his eyebrows raised, waiting for her to explain this unprecedented visit. 

“It didn’t seem appropriate to bring this up over the table, when servants might be around,” she began, immediately raising Corvo’s hackles, “but I’m concerned about both of you, so I thought I’d come speak to you. If you and Aramis continue to be lovers, you’ll need a cover story of some sort. I’ve already spoken to him about this, but he’s not any good at pretending to want women, so really you’re the relevant party.” She paused, doubtless waiting for some response. When it became clear that Corvo wasn’t going to say anything to this stunning opening statement, Hypatia continued. “I’d like to help if I can. If you’re amenable I can be your beard, so to speak, for public events. If you’re seen with me a few times in public and let it be known that you and I are intimate, people won’t look as closely at you and Aramis.”

Staring at her, Corvo tried to suppress the impulse to go for his sword. He disliked both the condescension of the offer and the fact that she knew anything at all about his private life. He considered denying that Aramis was his lover, but that could be disastrous if Aramis himself had told her. But if he had, why had he done so and what had he shared? Was there no end to Aramis’ foolish trust in others? 

“Why offer this?” Corvo bit out at last. “What’s in it for you?”

Hypatia’s forehead wrinkled up, apparently confused by this response. “Because Aramis is my dear friend, and neither of you deserve the way people react if they think someone is an invert,” she said, as though this were obvious. Then she reached out to lay a hand on his arm. Corvo froze, stiffening at the touch. “Do you really find it such a surprise that I care what happens to you?” Hypatia asked. “It is not as if I mind that you’re both men. No matter what the Abbey says about it being unnatural, same-sex mating behavior is as common throughout the animal kingdom as it is in humans. Sokolov published some excellent monographs on the subject, in fact. Got in all sorts of trouble with the Abbey.”

Corvo was well aware of this, having read them. Sokolov had presented the articles to Emily at the age of twelve, possibly with the intention of evening out the lopsided sexual education Emily had received from her six months in the Golden Cat. (After all, she hadn’t been kept in the smaller and far more private establishment across the street, the Steel Fox.) Corvo was still grateful to Sokolov for giving Emily those articles, and to a lesser degree for the way Sokolov had seemed to see something in Emily that prompted him to share his own extensive stories of sleeping with other men. Possibly Sokolov’s intervention was what had kept Emily from developing the sorts of shame and fear that others felt about their desires, and allowed her to meet and be happy with Wyman. Corvo had certainly not known how to explain anything of the sort to her. 

But it didn’t mean Corvo appreciated Hypatia prying into his own ‘same-sex mating behavior’ either. He forced himself to take a deep breath, though, because she did have a point. The situation was contained for now, but servants might talk or some other unscrupulous past lover might emerge if they suspected Aramis’ involvement with Corvo. Money was a tempting enough reward for blackmail. The possibility of holding influence over the former Lord Protector and thus the Empress herself would be a very great prize for the unscrupulous.  

Corvo forced himself to bend his head to Hypatia in acknowledgement.  “Thank you. The grand re-opening of Addermire Institute ought to be public enough.”

This earned him a bright smile, transmuting the lines around her eyes from a thin tracery to deep furrows. “I was going to suggest it myself! Which reminds me--I have a favor to ask of you in return.” Corvo gritted his jaw. “I will not be returning to work at Addermire personally, but I am responsible for selecting an appropriate staff of doctors and nurses. There are some I know personally, but many others have applied whose credentials I cannot verify and whose characters I cannot vouch for. Would it be possible for you to help me look into them?”

Relaxing again, Corvo nodded. Lately she’d been exchanging regular letters on the subject, and he’d seen the lists of names. He had considered investigating them on his own, but it would be much easier to do it with her involvement. 

“And one last thing,” Alexandria added, but then stopped herself, chewing on her bottom lip. “Or--well, maybe I should not ask. I think you will take it amiss.”

Given what she had already just proposed and how much he had already taken it amiss, Corvo’s eyebrows rose. He had stood from his writing desk when she entered the room, and now he leaned his backside against it as he waited her out in silence. 

“You always do that, that silent thing where you stand there and stare,” she complained, gesturing at all of him. Which was fair, because he did always do that. Why waste words when a silence served? It was something Emily had said of him once when she was young, and then laughed about all the similar-sounding words grouped together that way. “It’s just--you know I’m a doctor, Corvo. I don’t like seeing you in pain.”

Corvo tensed, made himself hide it, and stared intently at her face, saying nothing. She looked uncomfortable, and shoved her hands into her pockets. 

“Your limp has gotten worse in the months you’ve been here,” she stated. “Most people would not notice, but I do. You’ve even changed the ways you sit and stand.”

Corvo merely continued his staring. He knew this, and he hated that  _ she _ knew this. He’d meant to contact Mindy Blanchard, a Howler Emily had spoken of, in search of bone charms to alleviate the pain. The fact that an outside person had noticed the issue before he had addressed it plainly told him how lax he’d been, caught up in Aramis.

“Joint problems often aren’t curable, but there are things we can do,” Hypatia added, plowing onward in the face of his nonresponsiveness. “There are ointments we can put on the surrounding tissues to at least help with muscle relaxation. The S & J elixir only repairs soft tissue damage, as I’m sure you know, but there are poppy tinctures we can give you to help with the pain, especially at night.”

At this Corvo snorted. As if he would take anything which would so dull his senses and wits.

“If not poppy then willow bark!" she snapped, seeing his dismissal. "Or we could get you a masseuse.”

He merely lifted his eyebrows at her again, implying how ridiculous it was to imagine he would let some stranger near his unclothed body. He wondered how much Aramis had told her of the scarring, and if that was why she was meddling in his affairs now. 

“Tell me about the people on your list of clinicians,” he said instead, changing the topic. She looked at him for a long moment before sighing. 

The next half an hour passed more pleasantly, as she told him what knowledge she had. By the time the clocks rang seven and she left to change her clothes, Corvo felt almost relaxed again. 

**

That evening, Corvo left the house to go to the Crone’s Hand Saloon. He had scouted it out within a week of arriving, since it did not do to stay ignorant of the gang headquarters a block away from one’s home. He knew where most of the local Howlers lived, too, including Mindy’s lodgings near the Abbey outpost. And he had of course visited the black market (and purchased a small wristbow and ammunition there), but they only sold whatever bone charms came their way rather than being able to make them specially.

Corvo walked in through the saloon’s front door, watching as the Howlers there and in the street leading up to the Saloon perked up at the sight of him, recognizing his face. Whispers eddied in his wake. He was not safe here, of course, but safe enough as his notoriety offered him some protection. Corvo thought fondly of Slackjaw back in Dunwall, wishing he were still alive and that it was the Bottle Street Boys he were going to rather than the Howlers.

He found Mindy and Paolo together upstairs, and they both smiled and stood to greet him, offering him their hands. Corvo shook them, squeezing tight and looking into their eyes. He wondered how much they had changed after Emily had done whatever she'd done here. 

“Lord Corvo,” Paolo purred. “Been wondering if I would get to meet you. Welcome. What are you here for?”

Straight to the point. Corvo loved how people who weren’t nobs did that. 

“I’m looking for custom bone charms,” he admitted. “My daughter tells me you have contacts.”

Mindy smiled at him, her gaze traveling up and down his body as the three of them seated themselves at the table where they had clearly been in the midst of a card game. Mindy leaned sideways to a fine wooden box, pulling out a cigar and offering it to Corvo. He calculated the chances of it containing some sort of poison--sans the Mark, he no longer had unnatural resistance--but figured the odds were low and the risk of offending her high if he refused. So he accepted the cigar. He nipped the end off with his pocket knife and leaned forward when she lit a match for him. 

It was a very fine cigar, and she watched him take in the smoke with unconcealed pleasure. 

“We do have contacts,” Paolo said, his admiration of Corvo’s body less overt but still legible in his gaze. “The Eyeless can get you any kind of bone charm you could possibly want. Real powerful ones, too. Best crafters in the city. So why are you here and not approaching them yourself?”

“If I wanted to deal with the Eyeless, I would have,” Corvo said simply. He looked at Mindy. “My daughter liked you when she was here. Said you made and honored a fair trade with her, and that you have no love for Overseers. That’s enough recommendation for me. And the less easily this can be tied to me, the better. I don’t want the Abbey sniffing around my door.”

“Nobody in this neighborhood wants the Abbey sniffing around  _ Aramis’ _ door,” Mindy snorted. “Everybody knows you’re friends with him and Hypatia. For that alone, in this neighborhood at least, people who ain’t zealots will give you a lot of leniency. And Hypatia’s doctored some of our people and did a good job of ‘em. In this neighborhood, we look after those who treat us right.”

Nodding, Corvo took another deep drag on the cigar, tightening his lips around it and filling himself with the rich smoke for several heartbeats before releasing it in a long, slow exhalation. He let it turn into a sigh of pleasure, performing a little for his hosts. His time in court had taught him the very great benefits of sometimes allowing himself to be seen as an object of desire--whether physical or political. 

“So now I know what you want,” Paolo said, smiling as he picked his own cigar up from the ashtray and relit it. Its smoke seeped from his mouth and nose, making him look like a dragon from illustrations of Pandyssian monsters. “So what are you willing to do for me if I get you these bone charms?”

Having anticipated this question, Corvo leaned back, flicking his eyes between Paolo and Mindy. 

“I’m sure you have a list of Overseers you want dead or taken out of commission. If you bring me a name, or even two, and proof that they’ve abused their position, I’ll take care of them for you.”

Mindy bit her lip and smiled, giving Corvo a slow, languid blink like a contented cat. Paolo let out a slow, gravelly laugh. 

“I can tell you really did grow up in this neighborhood, Lord Attano,” Paolo smirked. 

Corvo smiled back. Paolo didn't need to know that Corvo's dislike for the Abbey had come after leaving Serkonos.

**

Two weeks, two dead Overseer rapists, and three new bone charms later, Corvo seated himself at the dinner table in greater comfort than he’d felt in years. The relief from the pain kept washing over him in waves. His knees didn’t hurt, his hips didn’t hurt, his hands didn’t hurt, his back didn’t hurt.  _ Blissful _ . He was already plotting how he could keep the most relevant charm on while riding Aramis. Perhaps Aramis would be tolerant? Corvo had found a few bone charms doubtless belonging to Aramis himself among the man’s other private belongings, so surely Aramis would not find this one too offensive, especially given its inoffensive purpose. 

But Hypatia’s eyes immediately fell on him, and she kept glancing back to him during dinner. Corvo allowed himself a little quiet disappointment; clearly it had been too much to hope that she would not notice the difference. 

She cornered him after dinner, slipping into his office. 

“Your gait is better today, did you take my advice about the poppy tincture?”

Lifting his eyebrows at her, Corvo pointedly shuffled papers on his desk, searching for a stack of letters from his inquiries about the Addermire staff. Hypatia’s face hardened.

“You are infuriating. You do that on purpose just to make me feel awkward!” she said, and then snorted. “I have to assume you would be less irksome under the influence of poppy, so maybe it is not that.” Having tried poppy several times in his youth, with Jessamine, Corvo knew for a fact that Hypatia was correct. He remembered being gloriously relaxed, at peace with himself and his life, delighted with Jessamine’s beauty and the feel of his own body as he held her. That, of course, had not lasted long, and had they not been locked in the royal saferoom, it would have rendered him unable to fulfill his duties. Nowhere could ever be as safe again, and Corvo had seen men grow dependent on the stuff, unable to function without it. He wasn’t about to let that become him.  

“What did you find that works so well, then?” Hypatia continued. “Please tell me you are not simply masking the pain better.”

Corvo uncapped his inkwell and began on a letter to one of the surgeon candidates, determined to ignore Hypatia till she grew fed up and left. He talked to her every night over dinner, and enjoyed her company well enough then. She was a clever woman, and took pains to explain her work in ways that both Aramis and Corvo would understand. But he wasn’t going to encourage her to pry into his personal life yet again. 

Rather than being dissuaded, however, she leaned on the edge of his desk, near enough that the soft flesh of her hip pressed up against his elbow. 

“Are you this maddening with Aramis? I would assume not, given that he seems very happy with you.” Corvo resisted grinding his teeth, knowing she would be able to see the flex of his jaw muscles. “Or perhaps you  _ are _ like this and he simply does not take it ill. He finds your reticence charming, you know. Sees you as shy and a good listener rather than condescending and distrustful. Do you think he would still feel that way if he found out that you go through his private belongings?”

At this Corvo straightened and turned his head upward to stare at her. The bald statement would have been a threat from anyone else--from her, Corvo didn’t know what it was. Corvo itched to draw his sword, or to get up and leave the room. But he did neither, and Hypatia only sighed.  

“Oh, don’t take offense. I’ve known what you do at night since you first arrived here. At first I was angry--I smelled you in my lab and in my rooms. The oils from your fingers all over my papers and equipment, and your scent everywhere in my spaces. I followed the smell of you into his rooms too, long before you had any right to be there. But....” she trailed off, and then broke the stare between them, her golden-hazel eyes turning away and her shoulders hunching. Corvo recalled what Emily had said of the Crown Killer, of her inhuman senses and unnatural strength. He hadn’t realized how many of the monster’s abilities still remained in the absence of the serum itself.

Sweat prickled along his palms, and he carefully set down his pen and capped the inkwell.

“I think Aramis and I both understand that Spymaster and Protector are difficult roles to leave behind, especially after so long. I like to think that you are watchful because you don’t know any other way to be. So as rude as it is, I’m prepared to be forgiving. And perhaps it is best, after all.” 

At this, Corvo did grit his jaw. He hadn’t actually expected either of his hosts to realize what he’d been doing. He wasn’t embarrassed, he refused to feel ashamed of taking reasonable care of himself and those around him, but he didn’t like having it named outright, either.

“I wasn’t going to bring any of this up with you, but....I’ve been having nightmares again,” Hypatia went on, and Corvo tensed still further, enough that even with the charm his hip complained. She blinked rapidly, eyes glistening in the lamplight and evening sun through the window. “I had them every night for months after your daughter rescued me. I took poppy tincture myself at times, just trying to sleep without dreaming. Lately, the horrible visions have returned.” Corvo’s mind raced down paths which this conversation might follow, anticipating escape routes, killing blows, chokeholds. “If something goes wrong,” she continued, her brow wrinkling up, “if I lose control of myself again....” 

She swallowed and then Corvo understood, the knowledge like a hot coal in his chest. This was not a woman threatening someone she disapproved of as a lover to her friend--this was Hypatia declaring  _ herself _ a threat.

“With your training you might be able to take me,” Hypatia finished. “So it’s good that you watch me. Neither of us wants a repeat of the Crown Killer murders, do we?”

She turned her watery eyes down to him again at last, and he held her stare. 

“No, we do not,” he agreed, voice as calm as he could make it. 

“So you understand why I am concerned for your health,” she went on. “I have lost only a little muscle mass since your daughter rescued me, and  _ none _ of my other capacities. Normal men were never any match for me--but a champion swordfighter as canny as you seems like better odds. Before you arrived, before you showed signs of staying, I was in the process of finding elsewhere to live. But now, I think it is safest for everyone if I am close to you.” 

Turning his chair so that he faced her more fully, Corvo nodded, forcing himself to relax the clenched muscles along his spine. 

“Is there anything else I should know?” he asked, tone neutral as though he were merely curious. 

“I think we should spar,” she stated, “so that you can get a better sense of me. And I think you should let me examine you. Even if by some miracle you’ve managed your pain well enough on your own, and the cause isn’t arthritis or damage to your tendons or ligaments, I would lay good odds you have other health concerns.”

“So you’re suggesting I show all my potential weaknesses to the Crown Killer?” Corvo asked, leaning back a little more in his chair. Hypatia winced. 

“She knows what I know, so this is not an ideal solution, no,” she acknowledged. “But can you honestly tell me there is any other physician you would allow near you? Please, Corvo,” she begged, earnestness in every line of her face. Her hands came up off the desk, clutching at each other so the knuckles went white. “I need to believe that if something happens to me again, someone will stop me.”

She had him there. If he had any duty to others now that he had been relieved of his life’s work, it was his duty to protect people from any lingering risk from the Crown Killer. It had been his goal before the coup, and it was still his goal now that his lover and the former Crown Killer lived together under the same roof. 

But Corvo had survived the last fifteen years in part by refusing to allow anyone near enough to him to assess him, leaving his reputation intact and his capabilities shrouded in mystery. He had hated even the necessary self-disclosure of telling Mindy and Paolo which charms he needed, and had done his best to disguise them as a request for Aramis instead of himself, though he was sure they had not believed him. 

But Corvo knew that even the relevant bone charm was a stopgap measure--it numbed the pain rather than fixing the problem. Eventually Corvo  _ would _ lose more mobility, and when that happened, he would need a doctor he could trust. 

“Fine,” Corvo replied, grimacing with what he knew was bad grace. “Tomorrow before lunch, we can spar in the courtyard. You can examine me now, before dinner.”

This earned him an immediate bright smile, Hypatia’s whole posture lifting.

“Wonderful! If you could disrobe for me, then, and--hmm. This would be better with a bed, since the floor will not be comfortable.”

He lifted an eyebrow at her, but she clearly hadn’t even realized what her words sounded like. So he kept his prurient thoughts to himself, gesturing her to follow him as he retreated to his rooms. He had never expected to take another woman to his chambers, but if he had, this wouldn’t have been the way he’d imagined it. Halfway to his bedroom, though, she paused, retreating to fetch her equipment. A minute later, she trotted in with a bag of tools. Corvo didn’t let himself wonder what was in it. He’d agreed to this, so he’d see it through.

First, she seated him on his bedside, and had him open his mouth so she could peer into his throat. 

“Any oral problems? Toothache, throat pain?”

Corvo had had a bad molar removed last year, and he was sure she could see the gap it had left between his remaining teeth. But he merely made a negative noise. 

Standing this close, he could smell the vagaries of her day upon her: disinfectants, herbs, her own sweat, and a few bitter aromas he couldn’t place. Apparently pleased with whatever she saw in his mouth, she held out her hands near his face. 

“May I palpate your neck?”

Corvo suppressed the automatic ‘no’ that wanted to escape him, merely allowing himself a long-suffering sigh. She gave him an embarrassed look, and lifted her warm fingertips to the underside of his chin, feeling along his jaw and throat. She checked his eyes with a bright light, peered into his ears in a way Corvo found strangely embarrassing, and then asked him again to undress. 

Swallowing hard, Corvo told himself that this was necessary. Probably. Everything in him screamed that this was a bad idea, that he was making a terrible mistake by revealing anything of himself to Hypatia, but then, what did it matter if he was? If she killed him in the end because of something he revealed now, that would simply mean he wouldn’t live to become any more of a failure. 

That thought calmed him, so after a brief staring contest with her, he disrobed to the waist. 

Her eyes tracked over the revealed skin, clinical and detached, but Corvo also saw her nostrils flare and she inhaled several times. Then she hooked the stethoscope into her ears and pressed the flat end to his chest, listening as he breathed. 

At this distance, he could see the peachfuzz that grew on her upper lip and the corners of her jaw, fine nearly-invisible pale brown hairs. He wondered how they would feel on his fingertips or mouth--and then squashed the aberrant thought. It was only that sleeping with Aramis had made Corvo think such things again. 

Hypatia checked his joints all the way from his fingers to his shoulders, feeling them for swelling and asking him to move certain ways to determine range of motion, and inquiring about the pain in each. He wasn’t sure how to judge pain anymore, given that he was always in some amount of it, but he did his best to quantify. The joint pain and muscular pain and gut pain he experienced every day were different from the numbness and tingling he often had in portions of his right hand, and the constant low-level pain which often went with that. She asked when that had begun, and he told her it was a result of injuries from fighting when he was younger. When she inquired if he had experienced loss of mobility, he braced himself and told her that there were sometimes small things he couldn’t do with that hand because he couldn’t seem to make it cooperate. Narrowing his eyes, he informed her that it hadn’t affected his ability with a sword. 

“Nerve damage,” she told him with a sigh. “Probably from breaking your hand several times.”

What followed after was a whole array of questions about his digestion, sleep habits, and other injuries. She felt around the scar tissue all over him, her hands warm and gentle, but that didn’t stop the wave of memories of his time at Coldridge. Getting words out became more and more difficult as he remembered the demands that he confess to killing Jessamine, strapped down as they burned and beat and cut him. Hypatia frowned when he mentioned that he usually slept around five hours a night. 

“How long have you done that?” she asked, staring into his face. He didn’t want to tell her that he had been that way since Jessamine died, so he merely said longer than a decade. 

“It’s a wonder you’re not dead already,” she sighed, and he scowled at her.

In the end, when she had poked, prodded, palpated, peered into, and listened to what seemed like every part of him, she told him to redress. 

“So?” he asked, shrugging into his shirt. 

“You’re in tolerable health all things considered, but I can give you a tincture for your digestion, sleeping that little is probably taking years off your life, and we need to start being careful with your joints.”

He couldn’t help the snort that escaped him--all that effort just to hear what he could have told her himself!

“If you won’t take poppy to sleep,” she began, and he snorted again to show his dismissal of this possibility, “then we should find you something else. There are other herbs which might help. Will you at least consider them?”

Thinking of the things they had fed him in Coldridge, and how he’d spent most of that time not trusting the food because he was never sure what they put in it, he merely shrugged. He wasn’t about to make promises he wouldn’t keep. 

At dinner shortly after, he said even less than usual and ate very little. Hypatia kept glancing at him, but kept his eyes fixed on his plate. As soon as he finished eating what he could, he retreated from the table with little more than a glance at Aramis to see him looking concerned. Probably he expected Corvo to turn up in the lounge later, but Corvo sat at his desk writing letters until midnight instead, thinking of nothing but how to phrase what he needed to say. 

The Crown Killer had gotten what she wanted from him. Corvo would just have to hope tomorrow’s sparring match with her benefited him more. 

**

He slept poorly that night, even after he gave in to necessity and strung the new bone charm onto a ribbon around his neck to wear into bed. But the absence of the constant grinding pain in his joints and gripping tension in his belly still couldn’t tempt sleep into coming for him, apparently. He lay thinking about the several Crown Killer murder scenes he’d visited instead. In one, the victim’s viscera had been strung around the chandeliers and his blood used to paint the walls. It had somehow reminded Corvo of the time Emily, aged five and delighted by her own artistic prowess, had used black ink to paint flowers and cats all over the wallpaper of one of the sitting rooms. In both places, the palace sitting room and the scene of the crime, there had been a feeling of  _ Look at me, look what I can do. _

When Corvo finally slept, he fell into bad dreams in which he chased a shadowy woman through the winding backstreets and sewers of Dunwall. He woke up with the stench still in his nose, and part of his right hand numb. The effects of the nerve damage, as Hypatia had named it, sometimes worsened when he was too tense. 

He called for an early breakfast, eating what he could around the lead in his belly, and then went into the yard to pull a few switches from the yard trimmings. He didn’t dare fight anyone he cared about with real weapons, especially not someone he legitimately feared like Hypatia. So a few partially-dried sticks would do as stand-ins for his sword. 

At eight in the morning, as planned, Hypatia came into the courtyard where Corvo sat looking at the house, thinking about the ritual that had taken place here to bring Delilah back from the dead. Today in particular he felt ghosts crawling around his skin, saw shapes at the edges of his vision. But Hypatia smiled as if nothing was wrong, as if a witch hadn’t returned from the Void here and Hypatia herself didn’t have dozens of deaths on her conscience. 

“How did you sleep?” she asked, as soon as she was within speaking range. Corvo gave her a look that he hoped communicated both the ridiculousness of the prospect of sleep and his displeasure with her for asking. She sighed, clearly understanding his meaning. 

“You’re grumpy when you’re tired, aren’t you? Which, given that you’re apparently tired all the time, explains a lot.”

This earned her another glare, but he couldn’t deny that she might be right. 

“If you attacked me, would you use a weapon?” he asked instead.

For a second or two, her mouth tightened into a knot before she let out a shaky breath. 

“Depends on what I had to hand, honestly.”

Corvo lifted one of the sticks on the table, offering it to her, and took one himself. He stood, silently thanking Paolo and Mindy again for acquiring the charm. 

“So come at me,” he asked, quietly. For a while Hypatia simply stood, looking stressed and miserable and gripping at the stick in her hand. She swayed back and forth from foot to foot, looking all around the garden. The servants were all indoors right now, and wouldn’t be out to sweep the ever-present dust off the walkways for a while. 

Then, almost fast enough to catch Corvo off-guard, Hypatia attacked. A quick jab with her left hand, nails curled like claws. Corvo backstepped away from her, bringing his ‘sword’ up and around and slapping her arm with it. 

“I just cut your arm off,” he said as she came at him again, this time with the stick. 

Immediately he could see that she her unnatural speed. With most men, that would have been more than enough. Corvo blocked her attempted blow with his own stick, then stepped in and shoved hard at her shoulder, toppling her backwards. 

Shocked, she stared up at him, hair askew. Then she let out a wild laugh, smiling. 

“It was that easy for you? Really?”

He shrugged, offering her his hand. She took it, letting him pull her up--and then snapped her right arm around, jabbing her stick into his side. It stung only a little, but the mirth had gone from Hypatia’s face. Corvo stared at her, realizing that if it had been a knife she’d been holding, or a scalpel, or possibly even table utensils, he’d have a gut wound now. 

“With me, you should stay on your guard,” she told him. “I never knew she was going to come out until she already had. Meaning you may not know either.”

He nodded, irked by his own lapse, and swept her legs out from under her. Only his continued grip on her forearm kept her from hitting the ground again. 

What followed after was much like dancing--she had no skill with weapons, no capacity to read his moves, but she was so quick that it almost didn’t matter. She blocked as many moves as she took, and Corvo could feel the raw strength of her grip, her blows. He would have bruises from the places she struck him, and if she caught his face with her nails, she’d tear the skin right off. 

He forgot his anxiety, his tiredness, his partially-numb hand, and felt only the next step, and the next, and the next. She had a pattern: she liked going for his face and grabbing his limbs. She almost never outright went for a killing blow, far more interested in overpowering him and leaving marks. She never watched his feet either, never anticipated where he or his sword would be. If he got in close enough to her that she couldn’t see him telegraphing his moves, or if he feinted one way and attacked another, it was easy to ‘stab’ her. In the dim morning light, the sun still far too low to peek over the top of the high windbreaks, her eyes flashed gold. 

She caught him once, though, throwing him down and climbing on top. The back-alley brawl tactics he’d learned growing up on the streets of this neighborhood had him pitching her off him with a jab of his hips, bringing his ‘blade’ down immediately on her throat. She laughed at him, clearly delighted, and then caught him on a backswing and threw him off her as if he weighed nothing. 

It had been a long time since Corvo had fought without sorcery but his body still remembered it. Finally, when sweat was coming down both their necks and faces, he could block almost all of her attacks and catch her with his ‘blade’ against almost any attempt she made to get closer to him. 

And she laughed, stepping back with her hands up, the wrinkles around her eyes as deep as he’d ever seen them. They stood apart, panting. 

“Why is this funny?” he asked, discomfited by the laughter. 

She cast him a half-lidded look, head tilted back as she rolled her muscular shoulders. 

“Truce now, please?”

He nodded, giving her a shallow bow in recognition of her efforts. She threw her ‘knife’ aside, wiping at her face.

“Do you know how long I’ve spent worrying that  _ nobody _ could handle me if I relapsed?” she asked, pacing now. “Do you know how awful it has been worrying that I might kill Aramis or Lucia or my patients? I thought that if anything would bring her out, it would be this--” she gestured between them, “getting physical with you, having you attack me, touching you. But look at you, and look at me! It took you, what, half an hour of practice to figure out how to kill or disarm me almost immediately every time I attack you? And _I’m still me!”_ She laughed again, but now Corvo was breathing more deeply and not moving anymore, he could see the awful brightness of her eyes and how close she was to tears.

Corvo did not know what it was like to have been abused as she had been, but he thought he could guess. So he nodded his understanding.

“Hypatia--” he paused. He felt as though something had shifted for both of them, some unnamed fear settling into a lower gear. “Drea,” he said instead, using the more personal name she had told him over and over again to use and which he had resisted, wanting to keep a safe distance between himself and the Crown Killer. “Thank you for asking me for this. It was a good idea.”

He set down his stick upon a nearby table. She unbuttoned the cuff of one of her sleeves, pulling it back to reveal several scrapes and forming bruises on her forearm where he’d caught her. 

“I hate this,” she sighed, her smile fading, “I hate what Luca made me. I hate what I did.” Her eyes grew hard, muscles jumping at the corners of her jaw. “But I am so, so grateful that your daughter sent you here, to....us. If I may say so, you....fit here.”

Corvo looked at her, surprised by the statement. She saw the expression and gave him a tired smile. 

“You make Aramis happy,” she told him, rolling up her cuffs. He noticed the musculature of her forearms, the curve of the bones of her wrists. “He has so much love to give, and you allow him to give some of it, even as reticent and guarded as you are.” Corvo snorted, but she merely smiled. “And you make me feel as if I could be safe with people again. That means a great deal to me.”

He wanted to tell her not to rely on his capabilities, wanted to remind her that he had let down the Empire not once but twice, failing those important to him both times. There was a reason he had been forced to retire and was thus here rather than in Dunwall, and just because he was no longer at court did not mean that he would be any better at seeing disaster coming. 

But despite that, Corvo felt....not relaxed, exactly, but a kind of relief at having fought Drea. Knowing that his....friend....might at any moment become a vicious killer was nothing like comforting, but his whole body now held the knowing of how to handle her. He knew the pace and weight and strength of her, which meant he knew that he could and would be able to handle the Crown Killer if she ever re-emerged. 

“You’ll have bruises and scrapes too,” Drea remarked, looking him over. Corvo shrugged, but she gestured him closer with one hand as she turned toward the house. “No, don’t do that, don’t just dismiss your injuries. Let me put antiseptic on them, and some cream for the bruises. I insist.”

For once he thought better of fighting her over it, and instead followed her into her laboratory. He pulled off his shirt when directed, this time without so much protestation. 

Her hands were warm and gentle on him even though the alcohol stung in the small cuts, and after that she tenderly rubbed bruise treatment into the finger-marks she had left on him. She did the same on her own forearms before taking the pot of salve with her to her room, presumably to use it on her legs and backside where he’d tripped or toppled her. 

Corvo looked around the laboratory, considering glancing through her papers again. But what was the point? He never knew what any of it meant. And he wanted to believe that with her, at least, he already knew who the enemy was. 

When he returned to his room, he found himself unexpectedly tired, so he lay down on his mattress to just breathe for a while, as he sometimes did when sleep eluded him. 

He awoke again just before the lunch bell rang, blinking at the ceiling in surprise.

**

Pursuing information on the doctors and nurses--or those pretending to be medical professionals, in at least one case--helped fill Corvo’s days. Better still, Aramis requested that when Corvo finished with the medical staff he might look into the mine foremen next. There were a few Aramis suspected of mistreating the workers, or stealing money, or having been in Luca’s pay. Aramis had struggled to maintain complete control of the mines during the years of Luca’s tenure as Duke, and even now that Luca was out of the way, Aramis suspected there were some among the mining staff who worked against him. 

To Corvo’s surprise, neither the physical intimacy nor Aramis’ offer of infidelity had so far ruined the time Corvo spent with Aramis outside of the bedroom. Aramis remained every bit as attentive as ever, continuing their trend of reading or working together in the evenings even though they often adjourned to somewhere more private afterward.

Less pleasing was the fact that Corvo now found himself thinking often of Aramis throughout the day. He ought to have moved on already--Emily had only arranged for him to stay here so that he would not have to face the insecure lodgings of a hotel or go to the hassle of arranging  a living space to be ready before he arrived in Karnaca. But instead of leaving, whenever Corvo made progress in his tasks, he found himself looking forward to being able to share his findings with Aramis and Drea over meals. And he looked forward to hearing about Aramis and Drea’s work, too--her stories from the clinic were nearly always interesting to hear, and her care for her patients genuine. And Aramis knew just how to prompt her to continue talking so that between the two of them, Corvo could enjoy dinner every night with pleasurable conversation he rarely had to join unless he chose. 

Worse still, Corvo caught himself half-wishing he were able to sleep in a room with another person. Every time he left Aramis behind after sex, Corvo’s mattress and blankets seemed cold and unwelcoming by comparison even though they were also quiet and still. And it meant that Aramis lay vulnerable and alone in his own bed where any interloper might strike at him.

This was all a mistake, a massive error Corvo couldn’t seem to keep himself from prolonging. Letting it drag on and on would just make it more painful when it went wrong, or when Corvo left to return to Dunwall. Emily would come to her senses soon: she was young, and they had never been apart from each other before except for his trip around the Isles just before Jessamine’s death and Emily’s own two months here in Karnaca. It was understandable that she wished some time away from him to discover herself, and even more understandable that she resented him for his two massive failures. It was right that she had asked him to find and train a successor, too; without the Mark he very much felt his age, and as Drea had so plainly pointed out, his body would let him down soon even if his mind didn’t. 

But even though Emily refused Corvo every time he offered to return, she still wrote that she missed him in every letter she sent. So it was only a matter of time.

**

Soon enough all the Addermire candidates had been vetted, an appropriate number hired, their work paraphernalia moved into the Institute, and thus the day of the grand reopening arrived. Other than for his initial visit to greet the Duke, Corvo had not thought he’d have much use for the fine clothes he’d brought south with him. But he found himself donning them again, smoothing out the rich, subtle brocade of his vest and checking for fabric bulging around his hidden bone charms. His wristbow did not interrupt the smooth line of his left sleeve. The clothes meant he couldn’t easily reload it, but it still gave him one shot. Often one shot was all he needed.

When Corvo met Drea in the house’s entryway, he nodded approvingly at her own choice of garments. She looked exceptionally attractive in a flowing cashmere tunic of deep blue, a black waistcoat, and slate gray breeches. Her leather boots showed off her muscular calves and slender ankles, and her greying hair matched her steel buttons. She was every inch the sort of brilliant and attractive woman any man could wish to have at his side for a fete like this. Even knowing there was no real connection between them, Corvo felt a tingle of pride and anticipation at the thought of being seen with her. He had never had that privilege with Jessamine and he would never have it with Aramis either, but he could at least have this.

His years of bachelor status both before and after Jessamine’s death had prompted tremendous speculation. The theories varied depending on source: that he kept a secret lover, that he kept a secret  _ harem _ (the bias against Serkonan men plagued him everywhere in Dunwall), that he was an invert (as Aramis had suspected), that he had been castrated during his time in prison....endless bullshit crashing against the shores of his awareness. He had several times considered paying a nice young woman to show up somewhere at his side, but it would only have given fodder to the gossip-mongers and put her in danger. He liked that he had more control now, with Drea.

The event itself would be dull, full of nobility wishing to be glad-handed and clinicians who knew little of politics and too much about bloodfly infestations. Corvo anticipated having to spend most of his time by Drea’s side, listening to discussions of research he only knew enough about to be bored by. 

But at least Aramis also looked exceptionally fine in a grey-green jacket which brought out the coppery color of his hair. Aramis still didn’t have more than a few white strands on his head, unlike his companions. Corvo caught himself imagining pulling Aramis into one of the side-rooms at the Institute--Corvo had looked at floor plans this week, just to be sure he knew escape routes if necessary--and sucking the man off before returning to the gathering. The expensively tiny food would taste better after a satisfying mouthful of Aramis. 

The three walked together to the nearest canal, where Aramis had arranged for a boat to take them directly to the Institute. To Corvo’s approval, they spent most of the trip there in comfortable silence, enjoying the slow sunset, the clean smell of the ocean away from the docks and fisheries, and the warm, beautiful evening air. 

But the peace shattered before they even arrived at the island. Corvo could see from afar that the little docks were already crowded with people in fine clothes, and he tensed, straightening from his relaxed slouch. He scanned the crowd, counting individuals and noting which outfits could conceal weapons. Beside him Drea swallowed, nostrils flaring.

By the time they made it into the main hall, Corvo had counted no less than nine concealed weapons, and of course there would be more he couldn’t detect by sight alone. He passed one woman whose muscular companion was clearly more of a bodyguard than a lover, especially given the way her eyes followed a nobleman across the room who had a variety of knives stashed inside his clothes.

Corvo shook hands with too many oily, simpering people excited to meet the ‘prior Lord Protector,’ and he knew they were all sneering at him behind his back for his grotesque failure to protect anyone or anything. Given the fact that ‘Duke Luca’ himself was here tonight, Corvo knew the talk of the party would be the fact that the father of the recently-reinstated Empress and the supposed lover of the recently-dead one were in the same room together. Armando had of course made a public statement ‘recanting’ any support of Delilah and saying that she had seduced and brainwashed ‘him’ into treason. And he had made another announcement welcoming Corvo back to his homeland. But that mattered little to the rumor mill, and Corvo could hear the whispers following him.

Corvo reminded himself that he had agreed to come to this, and was staying in order to keep himself and Aramis and Drea safe. But it shocked Corvo to find how complacent he’d grown in his time at the Stilton estate, how unused to reading a crowded room and monitoring body language. His mind struggled to retain all the relevant details and track all the moving pieces while maintaining his habitual stoicism. This had been his daily reality for decades, how had he grown so soft so fast? 

Aramis stood in a conversation with a steel mill owner in the next room--out of Corvo’s sight, which upset him. But Corvo straightened his spine so he stood at his full height. It was fortunate Drea was unusually tall for a woman, or her arm through his would have reminded him too much of private moments with Jessamine, who had been so petite. Drea, at least, seemed more comfortable than Corvo would have expected--not smooth and elegant like Jessamine had been, but Drea’s eyes were warm in the lamplight and she greeted her colleagues with real pleasure. 

But by an hour into the event, a problem Corvo hadn’t anticipated began to manifest. Perhaps Drea had been drinking too much (Corvo didn’t think so, he’d only counted two glasses of champagne and he knew she had a high tolerance), or was simply too committed to the show they were making of their ‘relationship,’ but her hands began to wander. During one conversation, she wrapped an arm around him and laid her cheek on his shoulder. During another, her palm slipped from his waist to his hip, and then down to his ass, where she squeezed. 

At this Corvo blinked at her, silently asking her what was going on. She gave him a suggestive smile that Corvo knew for a fact would be discussed by many outside this event. The former Lord Protector’s sexual doings were of interest to many, but Drea herself was mostly discussed for her medical relevance to the city. This would change that, and fast--which was maybe her intent? But Corvo would have thought she’d have discussed it with him if she meant to take the ruse this far. 

Worse still, the way she kept touching him and the obvious possessive pleasure in her eyes when she looked at him were having an effect on him, too. He didn’t like the way his mind now supplied him with images of her in states of undress. But she was the first woman to come onto him in years with whom he was something like an  _ equal _ . The nobility of Dunwall certainly hadn’t felt like equals to him, often because they let him know in no uncertain terms that he was their inferior: a jumped-up Serkonan who’d seduced Jessamine and impregnated her with a bastard heir. Fit to be fucked, perhaps, but good for nothing else. Or, they viewed Corvo as a political power to be begged for favors and manipulated for personal gain. And with everyone who wasn’t nobility, the power difference between himself and them had been so vastly in his favor that it would have been wrong to consider it.

Aramis had drifted back into the room and Corvo looked to him in apology, but if Aramis noticed Drea’s behavior he didn’t seem to think anything of it. He merely smiled at Corvo across the room and raised his glass in a salute--so perhaps this was what  _ Aramis _ had expected Drea to do tonight?

Drea got into a discussion with a Karnacan landowner, a handsome slip of a thing who was considering making a donation to Addermire’s research division. He was a very small man, the top of his head barely reaching Corvo’s collarbones and Drea’s eyes, and obviously starstruck by Hypatia. When she gave him an impassioned account of her work with the miners and their families, he nodded with worshipful eyes in response to everything she said. Her grip tightened on Corvo’s arm, nails digging into his bicep. But when Corvo looked to her again, silently inquiring if something was wrong, she leaned up to kiss him on the mouth. 

Her lips were so, so soft. 

With a heroic feat of will Corvo managed to play along, giving her a matching smile when they parted. But when she showed signs of prolonging her discussion with the man, who was now looking rather dejected, Corvo excused himself--maybe it had just been a performance for the young man, to make him jealous? That didn’t make much sense, but then if Corvo left, maybe the pair of them could speak more candidly. Corvo’s eyes tracked from person to person as he passed out of the lobby and toward the carriage station where there would be open air and possibly a thinner crowd. He wanted to be alone, away from the noise and heat and Drea’s attentions, all of which wore upon him like grit in the air during one of Batista’s dust storms. 

When he reached one of the railings overlooking the water he leaned there, drawing deep, clean breaths into his lungs. Disgust at the world filled him up, all the conniving, the backstabbing, the endless fighting for attention and resources that he’d somehow managed to  _ forget _ while secreted away in the Stilton manor. Knives in everyone’s smiles, poison in their words, the supposedly well-bred talking down to Corvo and Aramis and Drea while still trying to curry their favor. How had he borne this for so many decades? He wanted to return to Dunwall, had to be sure Emily was safe and dared not trust in the skills of others, but now the thought of immersing himself in the imperial court again made his scars ache and the bits of gourmet food he’d eaten turn sour in his belly. On the railing, his knuckles paled with the force of his grip and the iron cut lines of dull pain into his palms. 

When he heard footsteps to his right, Corvo turned, saw that it was only Drea, and let himself look back to the sea. She wrapped herself around his back, fingers tangling into the fastenings of his waistcoat. For a few moments he almost welcomed the warm touch, the grounding firmness of her hands upon his belly, till he remembered that they were half-hidden by vines and out of eyesight of the partygoers, so there was no reason for her to touch him this way. 

“Come home with me,” she purred, her voice deeper and rougher than Corvo had ever heard it, just as he opened his mouth to ask her what this was about. “Let me fuck you. I’ve been burned up with envy knowing Aramis was satisfying you and smelling your sex in the halls. It’s _my_ turn now.”

Corvo twisted, half-ready to push her off and demand an apology for speaking about Aramis this way, when he saw her eyes. 

They were no longer their normal warm honey-green. They were a bright, glittering gold, shining in the fading sunset light. The deep magenta of the sunset looked red on her bared teeth as she smiled at him, gaze fixing on his mouth. 

They had brought  _ Grim Alex back to her sanctuary _ , right back to where she’d kept so many gruesome trophies. If any of what Emily had told him was true--and Emily had been very earnest about giving him all the information she had about Karnaca and the people he’d meet there--this was the  _ last _ place Corvo should have allowed Alexandria Hypatia to go. No wonder Emily had forced him out of his role as Spymaster and Protector if this was the kind of error he was still making. 

Alex licked her lips, nostrils flaring as she lifted her hands to run her fingers along Corvo’s scalp before grasping handfuls of his hair. It raised gooseflesh all over his body and drew a desperate shiver out of him. 

“You’re so afraid of me,” Alex crooned. “All coiled tight and ready to be pried apart. So let me take you somewhere more comfortable.” And she rose onto her toes, nuzzling into his beard with a rasping laugh.

If he had to die, he thought, he would prefer this. Probably he could escape her even now the Mark was gone, and certainly he could fight her, they had proven that a week ago. But if she were to harm him, then his death would create enough of a scandal to keep others safe from her. And it was a relief to no longer have to watch for danger in every shadow, because the danger was already  _ here _ , obvious and present. Besides, did he really wish to grow old and infirm until he became dependent upon some sort of caregiver? Did he really wish to become  _ helpless _ and unable to defend himself when something went wrong again? Better to grasp the inevitable disaster in his own hands for once. Maybe Grim Alex would kill him tonight, or maybe they would merely sleep together and Aramis would cast him out for faithlessness tomorrow. If so, then in a few years Corvo could quietly kill himself in the Clockwork Mansion. Make it look like an accident, as though he’d gotten caught in the gears. It would be so far away from Dunwall that there would be no way for Emily to be exposed to his mangled corpse. Yes, that would be best. 

_ Aramis deserves much better than me, _ Corvo thought.  _ I might as well prove it to him.  _

So instead of running Corvo turned his head and kissed Alex, licking between her lips until he drew his tongue along the sharp edge of her teeth. A part of him wondered if he would somehow be able to taste the human flesh she’d eaten but she only tasted of champagne. 

Then Alex dragged him down the steps to the carriage, pulling him in after her as she pumped the lever to make it go and then climbed on top him. Her clever fingers made quick work of his neck-cloth and collar, baring his throat to the salty air and digging her thumbs into the pulse points there. It only took a few seconds to make him lightheaded, clutching at her wrists without trying to stop her. It wasn’t exactly choking, she wasn’t blocking his airway, just the vessels leading to his brain. But he knew he could easily pass out this way. 

He should have hated it. Maybe part of him did, but the rest of him leaned his head back against the leather of the carriage seat even as the body-level panic set his heart to a wild throb below his breastbone. She removed her fingers a few moments later, mouth open as though trying to taste him through the wind, and let out a low, possessive growl. Then she did it again, sinking her thumbs into either side of his neck, cutting off the arterial pulse.

When they reached the dockside station, Corvo’s head spun and he could barely stand. The guards there thought him drunk, smiling as they helped Alex escort him upstairs to the next carriage car.

Corvo remembered very little of the rest of their trip across the city, only that he followed Alex from station to station. At some point while Corvo was floating and half-blind, she ripped open his waistcoat and shirt to get underneath, baring his chest to the cool night air and sending buttons pinging against the metal doors and into the streets below. Alex sank her teeth into his neck then, her hands wandering across his torso and squeezing greedily at his skin. It hurt, the bite of her incisors and the dig of her fingers, but Corvo only breathed harder as his vision cleared. He knew how to be hurt, and it meant no more endless waiting for it and remembering. 

Alex left perfect ringed impressions of her teeth on him as though his body were a dentist’s mold, first on one side and then the other, and Corvo merely clutched her back and let it happen. Her sex seared hot through their clothes as she rutted against his thigh and let out sharp little sounds of satisfaction as she used him for her pleasure. When she reached down to curl her fingers around him through his own slacks, Corvo found himself hard, curved along his hip as though pointed toward her like a compass. 

The fact of it burned him like a brand, leaving behind a new and paralyzing shame. He was so used to his cock being a reluctant participant that to find it eager in response to the  _ Crown Killer _ was beyond mortifying. Not for decades had he believed the Abbey’s claims of the inherent wickedness of deception or witchcraft or most of the other things he had done, but  _ this _ made him feel like a sinner. Maybe they were right, and contact with the Outsider had dirtied him in some unknown way that allowed him to respond to this, now. The black-eyed bastard was doubtless watching this and laughing anyway.

Alex’s eyes glittered in the moonlight as she blinked down at him before pressing her cheek to his and dragging in a deep breath by his ear. “Delicious,” she hissed, the speed of the electric car whipping their hair into tangles as she stroked him. His hands curled up in echo, hips rolling. “If I were just a few years older, I’d have this. But I’ve taken slides of the fluids produced before ejaculation and found sperm in them. Not worth the risk. But there are so many other things I can do with you instead.”

Corvo’s thoughts were too fogged from arousal and lack of oxygen to know how to respond, but his body reacted without permission, twitching into her grip. 

“I can’t wait to have you naked and just breathe in the smell of you,” Alex purred, her grip tightening around the curve of him. “You came to dinner once with Aramis’ semen still fresh on your face. Out of all the food in the room, that smell was all I could focus on. I almost bit through a chicken bone just to feel something solid in my mouth.” Alex chuckled as another spasm went through Corvo--horror, arousal, he wasn’t sure anymore. “He offered you to me, did you know that? Always so generous with his things.”

Corvo’s lashes scratched against her jaw as he blinked, remembering Aramis’ words to him weeks ago:  _ If you wish to carry on with others as well as me--especially women, I am aware there are some things I simply cannot provide--I will not take it amiss. _ Had Aramis set this up? Was he using Alex as the means to rid himself of Corvo’s unwanted company? Aramis was so earnest that Corvo couldn’t quite make himself believe it, but--

With a jolt, the carriage arrived at Batista station. The cold air along his bare belly as she pulled away from him scoured away his passivity, and his mind sped as Alex led him through the winding alleys to the Stilton Manor. 

Aramis could not have done this, surely. Corvo couldn’t believe it of him. Corvo had been wrong about people so often before, but he simply refused to believe he had been wrong here. And at that thought, a realization suddenly struck: Corvo  _ had _ to stop Alex before this went any further. He had thought she’d kill him in one of the alleys of the city somewhere, as the trip home had given her plenty of opportunities. Had she done so, she could easily have pretended that they’d been set upon by criminals and used that to explain away his corpse. But now--Aramis deserved better than Corvo, but he didn’t deserve the horror of finding Corvo’s corpse in his house. And if tonight led to anything other than death....

Corvo could survive rape, he was sure, but he’d gotten through Coldridge without enduring that particular indignity and he didn’t want to die with that memory in his mind. And what if she remembered herself in the middle of violating him? She’d never forgive him for allowing that to happen and neither would Aramis. Corvo had allowed what they’d done in the carriage, but if it went further--

It was late enough that no servants would be out in the courtyard. So as soon as the front gates closed behind him, Corvo flipped open his blade, tightened his grip on the hand Alex was pulling him along by, and wrenched her arm up behind her, throwing his whole weight onto her back. They slammed into the ground together, her body taking the blow with his right arm held ready to strike. 

Lying stunned underneath him, she blinked at the dim walls of the windbreak. Corvo saw the exact moment the unnatural light inside her went out and her gaze suddenly began tracking onto her surroundings. 

“What--what--” she gasped. Her lashes went wide, the lamps glittering in the whites of her eyes, but she didn’t fight him. She had trained him for this, though, and he neither loosened his grip nor lowered his sword. 

“Corvo? Is that you?”

He said nothing, mind racing over what he could use to secure her--if he removed his belt, he could tie her wrists. But knowing Alex’s strength, she might well be able to rip a leather belt apart. 

“Please tell me I didn’t hurt anyone this time,” she whispered, barely audible over the wretched howling of the wind. Dust and grit pattered down around them, dirtying their fine clothes. “Please,” she begged, awkwardly forcing her other arm behind her too at what looked like a painful angle and batting it against his hand. “Make sure I don’t do it again, I can’t bear it, please--”

Not about to turn down a good opportunity, Corvo kept his blade at the ready as he moved one knee to lean his whole weight on her wrists. It wouldn’t stop her if she really wanted to escape, but they couldn’t sit here all night either, so Corvo undid his belt left-handed. From there it was a moment’s work to tie her forearms to each other. She held still for it, to his surprise, and as soon as it was in place a shaking sob escaped her. 

He hissed in discomfort as he rose, feeling his knees grind as he moved and well aware now that without the bone charm his knees would be solid agony. He pulled her up after him, hauling her along by one arm.  She hung her head so that her hair covered her face. When he marched her to the front door she went, obedient as he opened it cautiously to peer inside. He didn’t want the servants to see either of them in their current state, and while they had been instructed not to wait up, it wasn’t impossible for someone to be in the front hall for some reason. But the entryway seemed abandoned, so Corvo snuck them both inside. 

His feet took him automatically to his own room, the place in all the house he knew best, and where he kept his stash of sleep-darts and other weapons in case he needed them. But Drea--and it seemed to be Drea, now--put up no further fight, seating herself in his chair without complaint. When he tied her feet to the legs of the chair, she allowed this too. 

At last, Corvo fetched out a sleeping dart and seated himself on his bed facing Alexandria, ready for anything. She looked back at him, her eyes tired and sad. He studied her, taking in the disheveled slant of her waistcoat and the dust in her hair and on her breeches. 

“So what now?” she asked at last. 

“What are the signs of Alex emerging? Do you even know?” he demanded. Emily had described watching the transition, and hearing the tale from his daughter had sent cold chills down Corvo’s spine for days. Now, though, faced with the woman herself, Corvo could see why Emily had approached her and moved around Alexandria's workspace even knowing her to be the Crown Killer. Emily had known her a much shorter time, but there was something compelling about Alexandria Hypatia. 

“I used to be able to....hear her. Talking to me,” Drea told him after a pause. “For weeks after Emily dosed me with the counter-serum, I still heard her voice, telling me that she’d find a way back someday.”

Corvo stared at her. The fact that Grim Alex had been right was not a pleasant thought. 

“What else?”

“It’s--it’s hard to say,” Drea hedged, licking her lips and looking away. 

“What do you _mean,_ it’s hard to say?”

She winced, eyes squeezing shut and mouth tightening into a knot of displeasure. 

“How badly did I hurt you?” she asked instead, sounding exhausted. “My memories aren’t clear when she--when  _ I _ am in that state.”

Corvo shrugged. He owed her some explanation, he thought, since he had let her get away with this. “No more than a few bite marks. Now answer the question.” 

Drea’s gaze focused into something sharp, boring into him, but she said nothing. 

“What aren’t you telling me?” Corvo demanded. “I repeat: what are the signs Alex is emerging?”

At this Drea sat back in the chair, leaning on her bound arms as she took deep breaths. She took in his open collar and whatever marks she must have left on his throat and chest before blowing out a long exhalation. 

“Small mercies,” she replied at last. “But....the problem with knowing if Alex is close is that....that her thoughts are not very different from mine.” She swallowed, clearly uncomfortable now. Corvo shifted his grip on his sword. “As a doctor, it’s easy to slip into seeing people as....limbs and organs, reactions and chemicals. And to imagine how much easier my job might be if I could just cut in and  _ look _ at things with my own eyes rather than guessing. The things Alex--no,” she stopped herself again, eyes turning to the ceiling for a moment before dropping back down to Corvo’s torso. “The things  _ I _ think when I’m in that state--they’re still coming from  _ me. _ I think terrible things all the time, I just normally would not say them or act on them. But she....I....in that state I have no filter, no restraint.” 

Corvo stared. Whatever he had expected her to say, it hadn’t been this. And yet, now he’d heard it, he wasn’t sure why he’d expected anything else. A shiver passed through her and didn’t stop, a fine trembling overtaking her. Corvo caught himself wishing for torturer’s tools of his own, and then felt sick. 

“She has no shame, no fear, no empathy,” Drea whispered, and in the dim light of the lamp--the servants had lit a lamp for Corvo, thoughtfully, so he wouldn’t have to turn on the harsh overheads late at night--Corvo saw a tear come down Drea’s cheek. “And so I worry that....maybe she’s what I’m  _ really _ like.”

Corvo didn’t know how to do....this. Perhaps a normal person, a good person like Aramis, would have told Drea that the thought was ridiculous and denied any truth in her words. But Corvo didn’t have it in himself to lie like that, not generally and especially not now. 

What Corvo  _ could _ do was to offer a truth of his own in payment for his own stupidity in using her as he had, or for allowing any of this to happen. Tit for tat. They’d both been foolish enough to get here, right now. 

“Once during the Rat Plague, after I escaped from prison,” Corvo told her, “I found a perch over one of the lower alleys of Dunwall. I sat there for half an hour, picking off weepers with my crossbow. I made it a game to see how many I could hit in the right eye. Then, when the rats came out in torrents to eat the bodies, I threw down fire bombs. They screamed as they burned, and I liked watching them twitch as they died.” 

Drea’s arms jerked, as though she’d tried to move and then given up almost as quickly, and then another shiver overtook her. For a moment they caught each other’s eyes, breathing almost in tandem, and in that silence, Corvo thought that they understood each other. 

“When I found the man who killed Jessamine,” Corvo continued, slow now, “he begged me to let him go. Said he felt guilty for what he’d done. I felt sorry for him, because I knew he was telling the truth. But I stabbed him through the heart anyway. I looked into his eyes as he died.” He shook his head. “And I  _ loved _ it. I didn’t even have the excuse of being manipulated or poisoned. ”

“It’s not the same,” Drea protested, a muscle ticcing in her leg. “That man--Daud!--he killed the Empress, threw the nation into chaos, sent you to prison--killed the woman you  _ loved!” _ Tears streamed down her face now, and the muscles of her thighs flexed as she shifted in her bonds. “But I....” she began, and then shut her eyes. “Even  _ you _ don’t know, do you? Nobody knows, I’ve made sure nobody knows, but I am so tired of living with it in silence.” Corvo’s eyebrows went up, wondering what could possibly be  _ worse _ than what they’d already discussed and he already knew. 

“She-- _ I _ tortured my own lover to death over the course of months,” Drea whispered, and Corvo felt the beating of his own heart in the palms of his hands. _“_ _ Months, _ Corvo,” she forced out, louder this time, and the tears came down her face freely now. “He was more than ten years younger than me, only just thirty, and so enthusiastic about helping our patients. He was a sweet man, generous and optimistic, and a good doctor. He deserved nothing I did to him and he--he died, only a day before Emily found me. She kept me from seeing his corpse, led me out of the recuperation wing and past the guards, but later I....I _remembered_....”

Corvo had wondered what had happened to Alexandria’s assistant, Bartholomeus Vasco, as he had seemingly disappeared. Emily had described Vasco's notes, and the dismembered and brutalized bodies in Alex’s lair, but she wouldn't have recognized Vasco's face to know which of the poor wretches had been him.  Corvo imagined himself at the mercy of Grim Alex for months and a ripple of nausea passed through him. He stood, unable to stay still any longer.

“I shouldn’t have gone to Addermire, especially not with you,” Drea whispered. And that was when the truth of the situation hit Corvo. 

“You relapsed because of  _ me _ being in that place with you,” he breathed. “Because you want me and I went there with you.”

For several long seconds the room lay still and silent as a corpse, and then she nodded, slow and painful. 

“When you were--” he stopped himself, rearranging his words. “Earlier this evening, you said Aramis had  _ offered _ me to you,” Corvo began, because he suddenly found he needed to know the full truth about this. “You said he was ‘generous with his things.’ Was that true?”

Drea laughed bitterly. “Is  _ that _ how I phrased it? I suppose, from her perspective....but no.” Shaking her head, she looked up toward the ceiling. “Of course Aramis wouldn’t do that, he’s not anything like--he and I talked weeks ago, that’s all. He had noticed my interest in you, and I had noticed his relationship with you, so I brought it up to him one evening. I offered to be  _ his _ beard, first, and he told me it would work better with you. Then he told me that he had spoken to you about your relationship with him, and that if you and I wished to take up together, that he would be accepting.” She turned toward Corvo, watching him as he paced. “I told him I was worried about relapse if I approached you, but he wasn’t, he just--” her voice broke, soft and sad. “He really loves you. He just wants you to be happy. And....me, too, I suppose. He wants us both to be happy.”

Corvo stared at her, feeling as though the ground had well and truly fallen out from under him at last. 

_ But it’s horseshit, _ Corvo thought.  _ Nobody wants that for their lover. So there had to be an ulterior motive for him arranging things this way. _

Corvo had  _ seen _ relationships like what Aramis offered. There were so many of them at court, with all the marriages made for political gain rather than love or trust or respect. Nearly all such spouses dallied with others, and much of the information about it had found its way to Corvo’s desk. He had kept track of murders and blackmail that had resulted from it, money made and bastards sired. The imperial court had always been a viper’s nest of inbreeding and backstabbing and social climbing and Corvo had never wanted anything to do with it. He still treasured the knowledge that Jessamine had committed to him and him alone, guilty as it made him feel and inadvisable as it had been. He had thought Aramis had left behind his attempts to be like the nobility--so why this?

Drea’s brow wrinkled and she shifted uncomfortably. Her hands were probably going numb. He would have to check the belt soon, he had made sure to fasten it tightly.

“Why did you even let me--” Drea began to ask, her words breaking the quiet and Corvo’s line of thought. “We trained for this, and yet I left  _ bite marks _ on you.”

The lie presented itself to him immediately, and for once he wasted no time in voicing his thought. 

“You only seemed interested in me, and I had to get you away from the event to somewhere private I could be sure nobody else would be injured. I could have fought you off on the way back, but then I would have been carrying you bound. The courtyard here seemed like the best possible place.”

She seemed to accept this, but she hung her head again. 

“I am sorry you had to make that choice. Truly.”

At this, Corvo approached her, realizing that he wanted this to be over one way or another. He did not want her pity or her guilt. 

“If I untie your arms, will you attack me?”

“No, but--”

“If I untie your arms,  _ will you attack me?” _ he repeated, louder this time. 

“I....I don’t  _ want _ to,” she said, clearly hesitant. 

That had to be good enough, he supposed, because he wasn’t about to keep her prisoner long-term like the Duke had. Keeping himself at the ready, Corvo circled behind her and unclasped his belt, then stepped back to let her work her arms free of it. Standing with his sword at the ready, he moved in front of her and nodded his chin at her legs, indicating that she untie the knots. After a few moments of rubbing at her doubtless-uncomfortable hands, she did. 

She seemed to want this to be over too, because once freed she crossed to his doorway. She didn’t look at him. 

“I am going to take some laudanum and sleep,” she informed him. “Tomorrow morning I will leave to stay with Lucia. I need time to think. I thought I was safest with you, but clearly that’s not true.”

With that, she walked out of the room without looking back, leaving Corvo to watch her go, numb fingers still gripped around his sword. 

For some minutes he paced. Then he tidied the room until it looked like nothing had happened there at all. Then he went into the entryway to wait for Aramis, staring blindly at the door and listening to every night-time sound until he heard the crunch of shoes on the flagstones outside.

When Aramis came in shortly after, he smiled at the sight of Corvo. But the smile faltered when he took in Corvo’s expression and his torn clothes. 

“What happened? I thought you and Drea--”

But Corvo only stood, jerking his head in the direction of Aramis’ rooms. Aramis followed after him, radiating concern into the silence. When the door to Aramis’ chambers closed behind them, he took Corvo into his arms. 

“ _ Acushla, _ what on earth--I expected to come home and find you happy!”

“I do not wish to talk about it,” Corvo bit out, but he pressed his face into Aramis’ neck, wanting nothing more than to breathe in the familiar smell of him. But Aramis instead smelled like the expensive spiced cigarettes some people had been smoking at Addermire and it only made Corvo think of the world he’d have to return to someday when Emily allowed him back to Dunwall.

“You never wish to talk about anything, but I’m worried,” Aramis told him. 

_ Please don’t deny me this, _ Corvo thought to himself.  _ Let me have one more night with you. _

“I want to sleep here,” Corvo said instead, hoping to distract the man, and Aramis clutched him tighter, big hands squeezing on Corvo’s lower back. 

“Oh dear,” was all Aramis replied. “Well--” he swallowed, “in the morning, then. Promise me that we will speak in the morning.”

Nodding against Aramis’ shoulder, Corvo pulled off his tattered jacket, throwing it carelessly against the wall. It was ruined, so there was no point folding it now. But when Corvo shucked the vest, and with it his bone charms, he couldn’t help flinching at the sudden and nauseating wave of pain that swept over his body. Aramis kept casting unhappy glances at Corvo as Aramis undressed himself, folding his own clothes onto a chair for the servants to take tomorrow--and Corvo realized that with everything as it already was, there was little reason to keep up a pretense. So he bent, now feeling the discomfort in his knees and spine from tackling Alex to the ground, and pulled out the relevant charm from the inner pockets of the vest. He had no ribbon to tie it on, having not anticipated needing one, so he just placed it on the pillow where he would lie. Aramis shot him a questioning look. 

“It keeps my joints from hurting,” Corvo gritted out, and Aramis relaxed again. Corvo wondered what the other man had thought it could be for that Corvo would bring it into bed with him at a time like this. But once Aramis had put on his nightclothes, he pulled down the covers to his large bed and allowed Corvo into it, letting Corvo curl around his back and breathe against his nape. 

Neither of them slept for a long while, and Corvo never slept at all even though he kept the bone charm clutched to his chest with one hand. He lay in the warmth listening to Aramis breathe. 

He would miss this when he left.


	4. Life in Karnaca

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This took me so long to complete. Thanks to [counterserum](https://archiveofourown.org/users/counterserum/pseuds/counterserum) for cheerleading and helping me talk this through!
> 
> CONTENT WARNINGS: this chapter contains SERIOUS depiction of suicidal ideation and planning. Please do not read if this is likely to be triggering or disturbing to you. If it is, skip the very end of the chapter.
> 
> Also, if consensual femdom isn't your thing, I dunno what to tell you, because this chapter definitely has that in it too. Also, a footjob. Sometimes you don't set out to write foot porn but end up doing it anyway.

Corvo felt the moment Aramis woke, a brief tensing of his big body and a harsher inhalation through his nose. The night had been miserable, long hours of turning over the events of the day, but Corvo found now that he still did not wish it to be over. If Aramis was going to be angry with him, Corvo did not wish to find out.

Aramis’ morning breath was terrible. But when he rolled onto his side to kiss along Corvo’s nose and eyes Corvo allowed it anyway. He’d been in the Dunwall sewers during the Rat Plague so a little sour breath was nothing by comparison. And he liked the tender impulse of it, that Aramis’ first thought upon waking was to show affection.

“Did you sleep at all?”

Corvo shook his head and Aramis sighed.

“I’ll get us breakfast,” Aramis said gently, and pulled away to stand and fetch his robe from a chair across the room. “Please be here when I get back.”

The door clicked shut behind Aramis, and Corvo stared at the ceiling, the bookshelves, the bedspread. He squeezed his hand around the bone charm, his palm tender now from doing so throughout the night. He liked the sting of it, the digging of bone and metal into his skin.

Familiar footsteps down the hall told Corvo of Aramis’ return, and he watched the doorknob until it turned, admitting Aramis himself bearing a heavy tray. On it was a newspaper, a small pot of tea, several rolls, a plate of ham, fried tomatoes, a dish of butter and another of jam. Aramis must have told the cook that he was very hungry indeed--or else Cathy knew that Aramis had a guest in his bedroom. In this moment, Corvo couldn’t find it in himself to care which.

“I almost didn’t bring the paper,” Aramis said, settling the tray on the bedside table. “But it seemed....relevant.” Aramis picked it up and handed it over to Corvo, who unfolded it and read the headline.

 _Romance at Addermire!_ Read the biggest font along the front page. Below it in smaller font, the subtitle went on: _Doctor Alexandria Hypatia and the Former Lord Protector Seen Together at Grand Reopening of the Institute._

Corvo wanted to crush it and throw it into the fire. He wanted to tear it apart with his teeth. But instead he merely set it aside, not wanting to look at the smug typography any longer.

Aramis divided the food between plates, offering servings to Corvo. He ate it mechanically because he knew Aramis expected it of him, and because it was thoughtful of the man not to force Corvo to face an unpleasant conversation on an empty stomach. When they had both eaten and each sat against the headboard with a cup of tea, Aramis finally asked again.

“What happened last night? You have....marks, on your neck, but you’re clearly not happy. And Jaime told me that Drea came by the kitchens just before me with a suitcase full of clothes, saying she intended to stay with Lucia for a week. It had the whole kitchen in an uproar, especially with that headline on the paper.”

Staring into his cup, Corvo thought idly about those who claimed to be able to read the future in tea leaves, rat entrails, or runestones. All he saw in his tea was the reflection of the ceiling.

“She relapsed last night,” Corvo forced out, after far too long a pause, and heard the sharp indraw of breath and Aramis jerked as though struck. “Because I allowed her to return to Addermire.”

“Did she--is she--” He fumbled for words. “You’re clearly not injured, but is anyone else--”

“She is not seriously injured, so far as I know, and nobody else was injured at all. She only wanted me. To keep others safe, I allowed her to think she had gotten what she wanted for the duration of the trip across the city,” Corvo lied, and wondered if he might eventually convince even himself that it was the truth. It was _almost_ true, _close_ to truth, if he ignored the part where he had wanted her to kill him--and wanted _her,_ too. He remembered the pleasure of her stroking him through his clothes in the carriage, the way part of him had enjoyed the way she treated him.

“And then?” Aramis prompted, leaning forward as though to place a hand on Corvo’s bare shoulder but stopping at the last moment. Corvo didn’t know whether to feel grateful or not.

“I incapacitated her. She came back to herself quickly after that.”

Setting his cup down on the tray, Aramis shuffled across the bed to sit closer to Corvo. Corvo made himself not respond, neither flinching away nor leaning into the proximity.

“I’ll go check on her later today,” Aramis said, laying a careful hand on Corvo’s where he still held the bone charm. “I’m glad you’re both safe, at least, though I can’t--I can’t express how sorry I am that this happened, to both of you. Is there anything I can do?”

Corvo turned to stare at the other man, searching his earnest face for disgust, for doubt, for deception. But Aramis met Corvo’s stare with distressed eyebrows, and his thumb stroked over the bone at the base of Corvo’s wrist.

“Aren’t you angry that I....” Corvo began, and didn’t know how to finish it. _That I let someone else touch me, that I failed you both, that you give so much and get this back in repayment._ He squeezed the bone charm again, digging its edges into himself.

“That you....?” Aramis prompted, then shifted away, seeming to realize something. “Wait, do you think that I’m--what, _jealous?_ Because of something like _this?”_

Corvo said nothing. Of course he thought that. But Aramis dragged in a frustrated breath, his hand gripping on Corvo’s.

“I expected to come home to find the two of you _happy,_ Corvo,” Aramis said, his words slow and careful. “I feel....felt....” he shifted again, crossing his legs differently. “If I am being truthful, then yes, the thought of you with someone else gives me some anxiety. I worry that you might wish to marry and leave me behind.”

“So why would you--” Corvo began to demand, but Aramis held his other hand up, gesturing Corvo to silence. Corvo accepted it with relief.

“If it were not the two of you, specifically--a dear friend I have lived with for nearly a year now, and you, a man whom I know to be cautious and serious and circumspect--I might not have offered. But I trust the two of you, specifically. Neither of you would--well, while in your right minds, at least--neither of you would wish me harm or take me for granted.”

“That is not what you offered when we last spoke of this,” Corvo pressed. The words of that conversation were fixed in his mind and he recalled them all too well. But Aramis only let out a bitter laugh.

“I did not want to pressure you into something with her if you didn’t desire her. I know an attractive woman when I see one even if I do not feel anything in response to her, and I knew she wanted you. And you are so guarded that I assumed that if you were going to let anyone else close to you, it would be her.”

It bothered Corvo that he couldn’t refute the statement or even fault its logic.

“With Theo....” Aramis began, trailing off as he moved yet again to be more comfortable, this time leaning their shoulders together. “With Theo, he would sleep with other people and return to me happy. He would tell me what he had enjoyed, what had made it special and interesting--or boring and bizarre, in some cases.” Aramis snorted, and Corvo tried not to let himself show his disgust at the concept of a lover returning to _him_ with tales of other bedmates--or of _being_ a lover reported on in such a way. “For some years it made me uncomfortable. I was worried about what it meant for and about me. But in the end I realized that the variety just gave him ideas for new things to try with me, and that he came to me with all that because he trusted me and wanted to share every part of himself. I did not like how little time we were able to spend together, but the difference it would have made for him to stop sleeping with others would have been slight, as they were often one-offs. He had to travel often, and his family as well as his duties as the Duke demanded much of his time. But even so he set aside one night a week every week for me, and kept that arrangement for years.”

Squeezing Corvo’s hand, Aramis turned to look at him. Corvo refused to look back. “Getting to see you as often as I do feels like a dream,” Aramis admitted, far too generous as usual. It made a pain start up along Corvo’s sternum that the bone charm didn’t seem to help. “I didn’t want this for either of you. I had no idea that....that relapse was even possible for her. I thought without the serum....”

Swinging his legs over the side of the bed, Aramis untied his dressing gown and went into his closet for actual clothes.

“I am going to visit Drea,” he said, tone cautious again. “Will you come with me?”

Corvo shook his head. He needed time to think, and bathe, and probably she would not wish to see him again so soon after last night, if ever. Or maybe she _did_ wish to see him, which might be worse for all involved.

Aramis dressed, brushed his hair and his teeth and then sat again on the bedside to pull on his boots. Corvo lay unmoving and exhausted, still staring at the wall, the ceiling, the furniture.

“I’ll be back in a few hours,” Aramis informed him, and twisted to grasp Corvo’s hand and lay a kiss on it, the tenderness of the gesture absurd to Corvo. For a brief moment it caused him not to want the other man to leave. But he said nothing, did nothing, and Aramis closed the door behind him, his steps retreating down the hall once more.

A few minutes later, Corvo dragged himself out of bed, donned Aramis’ dressing gown (the smell of him wafted up from the fabric, providing a shade of comfort) and gathered his clothes in his arms. Listening carefully at the door for footsteps or voices, Corvo then made his way to his own rooms. They were undisturbed, as he had hoped. He had requested the servants only enter to clean every few days in the afternoons, and so far as he knew they had respected his wishes.

He ran a bath for himself, and as he watched the water running into the tub, he found Drea’s voice running through his head, reminding him that he needed to manage his injuries better. Last night he had needed his skills and he could need them again anytime. He had grown lax since coming to Serkonos.

So he pulled the room’s bell-cord and a few minutes later Betsan arrived.

“Yes, Lord Attano?” she asked, and as usual did not curtsy to him. It was a cultural habit that Corvo liked about this household, that the servants used polite address but gave no other indication of rank.

Corvo watched as Betsan clearly took in his state of partial dress and the marks on his neck and the absence of Hypatia in the house and came to all the wrong conclusions. Probably she thought that Hypatia had fled out of embarrassment at having been so wanton as to leave marks like this. Corvo suppressed a sigh, and asked Betsan for epsom salts for his bath.

Later, lying in the hot water and feeling the misery of his joints without the bone charm, he tried to force himself to think tactically about what to do next.

The whole city--and probably soon the rest of the damned Empire--now thought that he and Hypatia were involved. It would be safest for him and Aramis if people believed his faux-liaison with Alexandria were ongoing, but it might be safest for both Corvo himself and Drea to be separate. And yet, Corvo found himself loathe to accept Drea’s departure from the household as the undeniable outcome of last night. He liked very few people and trusted even fewer, and yet when he sat and thought it over, he found that he both liked and trusted Alexandria. She was dangerous, yes, but her danger was a known sum--and last night had not been half so violent as Corvo would have expected.

At this, Corvo blinked at the ceiling.

Alex had been assertive in her attraction, certainly, but no moreso than one might expect of a woman with no need for restraint who believed her feelings returned. And while she had bitten him hard enough to leave marks and scratched hard enough to leave welts, she had never drawn blood. Further, the kind of care and precision it took to choke a man as she had was not what Corvo would have expected of the Crown Killer. The Crown Killer was about loss of control followed by violence and the terror that caused in others--so why had she been so comparatively cautious? She hadn’t even crossed any serious social lines while in front of others, and had done nothing which would result in lasting harm to Corvo. They had taken the Crown Killer to her lair and she had....what, been a little rough with him while taking him home to show him a good time? It seemed ridiculous to be afraid when Corvo thought of it that way, so perhaps the person he had come home with last night had been mostly Drea and only a little bit of Alex?

Corvo shook his head then, disgusted at his own thoughts: trying to make excuses to go running back into danger! If Corvo wanted so badly to die, he ought to leave both Drea and Aramis out of it, depart for a different area of the city, and just do it himself, making it no one’s fault but his own.

And now that he was no longer face to face with Grim Alex, having found Aramis just as incomprehensibly trusting and patient as ever, Corvo found he wanted this life for just a little while longer. Last night he had wanted one more night with Aramis, expecting it to be over in the morning. Today, he wanted....as much as he could have. At least until the wedding, after which he could probably convince Emily to let him stay in Dunwall. Things would end naturally there, as Aramis was so gentle that he would let Corvo go.

Besides, maybe Corvo’s survival of Grim Alex had been pure chance and good timing on his part. She had, by her own admission, tortured Vasco for months: and that meant planning and restraint. A captured man required feeding, water, and the dressing of his wounds so he wouldn’t die too fast. Even Hiram Burrows hadn’t been half so mindful, and Corvo had almost died twice from infection while in Coldridge. So perhaps last night Alex had just been playing with her food like a hound with a rat, and had meant for the real horrors to start in the privacy of the Mansion.

A small, awful part of him suggested that if Corvo had taken Aramis at his word weeks ago, and if Corvo had not made the critical error of allowing Alexandria to return to Addermire, that this could have had a very different ending. For a brief moment he allowed himself to picture it: living with two people that he....that he....

Ducking his face under the water and digging his hands into his wet hair, Corvo crushed the thought. Ridiculous to allow it even for a moment! To have that would mean allowing _Aramis_ to sleep with other people too, and the concept made Corvo feel as though insects were crawling under his skin. With Aramis’ fine figure and money and kindness and other desirable qualities, he would almost inevitably find someone less damaged, more open, more....everything Corvo was not. No matter what Aramis felt right now, just because Corvo was nice to look at with all his clothes on and perhaps also a satisfying fuck didn’t mean he held up to closer scrutiny.

Once Corvo had drained the bath and dressed, he thought again of Drea’s words and what had happened last night and with a sigh took himself out of the house to the apothecary. They carried a fine salve for muscle relaxation, and no less than six different herbs known for aiding sleep, so he purchased some of each along with detailed instructions for how to use them. Perhaps if he had been better rested before now, he could have predicted this would happen. It seemed a far-fetched notion, but he didn’t know what else he could do to keep from failing, and failing, and failing.

And most of all Corvo had to keep himself together until he returned to Dunwall, because then Emily would need him in fighting condition. Anyway, Aramis deserved the best Corvo could provide of himself as long as he was here, and Drea deserved not to be let down again.

On his way home, Corvo dropped by the Crone’s Hand again. This time he asked Mindy if she knew of any fencers he could pay a small sum to spar with him a few times a week.

He emerged with a list of four names and addresses of Howlers he probably wouldn’t mind injuring by accident in a fight.

**

A day passed, then two, then three. The first two herbs Corvo tried did nothing to help him sleep and instead made him groggy and slow in the mornings, but the third worked, to his great surprise. Aramis had returned from Lucia’s house looking sad, and went out to visit Drea again the same evening. Corvo busied himself with work, but in the back of his mind his thoughts turned over and over.

Drea had clearly desired him for some time, given that Aramis had spoken to her about her interest weeks before their trip to the Institute. Possibly she had been interested since first meeting Corvo, as he remembered the way she had interacted with him even then. And she had told Corvo that she’d been having nightmares for weeks, which had instigated her prying into his health and asking to spar. She had also indicated that she could quite literally smell the result of Corvo’s private moments with Aramis, so probably she had known from the first what they were doing. (No wonder she had known to make her offer to Aramis. It explained a lot, really.) Which meant that, if Corvo’s suppositions were correct, the initiation of his relationship with Aramis might well have been the cause of the resurgence of her nightmares and her vulnerability to relapsing into Grim Alex.

But Drea had passed almost a full year without relapse, living peacefully with Aramis and seeing clients most days. No one had reported strange behavior from her, and so far as all of Corvo’s research had shown, all deaths in the district had been Howlers or Overseers or those injured in accidents. Distrustful as Corvo knew himself to be, he had spent years doing threat analysis as Royal Protector. And while he had known Alexandria to be a threat, he had eventually ranked her well below the local Overseers, who had been talking about raiding or even quarantining the Stilton manor due to (somewhat accurate) reports of haunting. It was next on Corvo’s list of matters to attend to.

Now that Drea _had_ relapsed, Corvo somehow felt less worried about her and more worried about _himself._ The fact that he had responded so strongly to the way Grim Alex had treated him was disturbing enough. But worse still were the signs that he was growing soft, credulous, gullible. He discovered that he missed Drea already and hated the silences her absence left between himself and Aramis. It was not that they couldn’t spend time together without her, but he found now that her presence had become part of what Corvo enjoyed about Aramis as well. He liked the parts of Aramis that she evoked, parts that Corvo himself did not know how to interact with or support. And even beyond the impact her absence had on Aramis, Corvo found that he missed Drea herself. She had a blunt frankness that, while he disliked it when she turned it on him, was nonetheless a trait he respected and enjoyed.

The only argument Corvo could possibly make to support her return to Stilton manor was that she had done nothing wrong until returned to Addermire, and little of real consequence even then. Which meant that so as long as they did not send her to the sites of any more Crown Killer murders, she ought to be safe. And even the way she had spoken to him seemed more like Drea than Alex. She had talked of taking slides of bodily fluids, and while Corvo could imagine Grim Alex being a calculated torturer, he could not picture her as a serious scientist. Maybe it had been mostly Drea after all?

In the end, the sadness on Aramis’ face when he returned from visiting Drea on day four of her absence forced Corvo to act. The next morning saw him taking the carriage to the Palace District at an early hour so that he could catch Drea there before she left for work when the clinic opened later in the morning.

When Corvo knocked, he found himself in a fine little apartment. Lucia gave him a look Corvo couldn’t interpret when she recognized who was at her door, but she led him in to the kitchen anyway, where Drea herself stood stirring something on the stove.

“Your gentleman caller is here,” Lucia said, voice dry and perhaps a little disapproving. Drea looked up, saw Corvo, and her face went through a sequence of expressions: surprise, anxiety, resignation, shame, and then finally settled into a blankness. She passed the stirring spoon to Lucia, who took it from her with another look of silent judgment at Corvo. He wondered what Drea had told her.

Gesturing him to the front door, Drea slipped her feet into the boots that stood there, told Lucia she would return in a few minutes, and then they were out into the street.

Unlike the Batista District, which woke up early and bustled with activity as the miners and their families prepared for the day, this district was quiet and almost deserted at this hour even though it was now after dawn. Moving figures could be seen through windows, but otherwise the two of them were alone.

“I didn’t expect to see you,” Drea told him, blunt and to the point as ever. “Why are you here?”

Steeling himself, Corvo swallowed and tried to ignore the very great part of himself that shouted that this was foolish, dangerous and naive. Probably it was, but he needed to do it anyway.

“Come back to the House,” he asked, voice quiet in the cool morning. The words made a little puff of mist that disappeared as quickly as the sound into the silence.

“I would not be safe for you,” she replied, quickly as though she had already gone through this argument in her head. His own response came just as fast.

“You were for months after I arrived.”

“I was safe for you until I wasn’t. Now I’m not, so I should find lodgings of my own.”

“Before the Grand Re-Opening,” he pushed, “would you have said you posed a danger to me?”

“Yes, obviously,” she snapped. “That’s why we sparred.”

“And then you relaxed again,” he pointed out, and it was strange having this discussion with someone other than himself for the first time.

“I should not have let down my guard.” She glanced sideways at him and Corvo let her look, but then she turned forward and away.

“Have you been to the sites of any other Crown Killer murders?” he asked, because that was the vital information he had not been able to access on his own. She flinched at the name, but also shook her head.

“No, that....was the first.”

“So don’t go to any more. It was not me who caused the relapse, it was the combination of me and that place. So as long as we keep you away from other places like that, you can go on living with Aramis.” _And me,_ a stupid part of him added, but he ignored it.

“But if I do it again--”

“I have not become less able to defend myself,” he cut her off again, the feeling of doing so bizarre and distasteful. But it had to be said.

They walked on in silence. Drea’s shoulders moved as she drew a long breath.

“Neither you nor Aramis would invite me back if you knew the thoughts I’ve been having,” she said, and at this, real curiosity and concern bloomed in Corvo. “Since before returning to the Institute, even,” she rushed to say, anticipating his response.

“Then tell me, and I will judge for myself,” Corvo replied, as he was hardly going to turn down more information. But at this she grabbed his arm, her fingers digging fresh bruises into his bicep as she hauled him around and glared into his face.

“I am not a game! It is my responsibility to keep those around me safe, even from myself. Have you learned nothing from what happened to you in--” she cut herself off, squeezing her eyes shut and her mouth closed before shaking her head and letting go of him.

Corvo had expected to feel afraid again in her presence, but all he felt now was calm, his heart beating slow and even as they walked.

“I’m sorry,” she began, turning to walk away. “I don’t like the way I am around you, that’s the problem. I don’t like the things I think about you.”

He again said nothing. He expected her to point out again that he was being manipulative, but instead she fell right into the space he left open.

“I always had thoughts. Everyone has strange thoughts sometimes, I think, but the Academy made it so much worse. A student brought in a live horse once, bought from the knacker yard and soon to die anyway. He etherized it and we opened it up on the table still alive. Intestines squirm, you know, they’re always moving to progress food through the digestive tract. A creature’s guts are like a basket full of eels. So I held this great squirming armful of this poor animal’s bloody guts as the other students dug deeper to look at its other parts and I thought-- _how incredible, I wonder what the inside of a person will feel like.”_

Having witnessed men disemboweled before, Corvo had seen men’s insides like that. He hadn’t felt anything like wonder at the stink and horror of it. But perhaps she needed to say it and he certainly needed to hear it. If she talked enough, perhaps she could convince them both to leave this where it stood, so she could walk away and he would let her.

“Maybe other doctors think like that,” she continued. “I don’t know because I never dared to ask. I’ve heard some in the Academy say things that I....that I wouldn’t....” she stopped, panting for air as if out of breath when Corvo knew for a fact she couldn’t be. “Until the serum, I would have said I’d never do anything like that,” she ended, as though the words cost her something. Probably they did. “The things that got Kirin expelled were....but later, when I was _her,_ I recreated some of them for myself. I can’t judge him anymore.”

 _Yes you can and should,_ Corvo thought, but he kept his silence. Their feet took them around a block of shop-fronts, the glass clean in a way that nothing ever was in the Batista District.

“When I look at you,” she murmured, and Corvo stopped breathing, losing track of himself after the inhale as he waited for the truth. “I think what a beautiful vivisection you would make, either etherized or conscious. I imagine taking a scalpel to you, opening you up from throat to pubic bone so that I could see _all_ of you. I could break open your ribcage so easily.”

Gooseflesh raised on Corvo’s already-chilled skin.

“I want to hold your lungs in my hands so I can feel you swell and pulsate,” she purred, the words spoken deep from her chest. “And I want to look inside you so that I can know everything that people did to you before me. I wonder how scarred you are inside where no one can see. How much damage has been done to your liver, your kidneys, your lungs, your _heart?_ I could see it with my eyes and touch it with my fingers if I had you open like that.”

Corvo felt as though there were already hands gripping his lungs. He couldn’t make himself do more than drag little gasps of air through his nose, couldn’t tell if this was fear or arousal or some awful combination of the two. He remembered holding Jessamine’s dead heart in his hand, still moving, still beating, the clockworks within glowing as she spoke to him. A monstrous gift from a monstrous god, letting Corvo hear her voice again beyond death.

He ought to have hated Drea’s words, they ought to have been too close to what he’d lived through for months in Coldridge. And they were, perhaps, but delivered in Drea’s soft alto with the memory of his beloved fluttering in his palm....

“That sounds like Grim Alex is in love with me,” Corvo choked out, voice weak and small.

Drea let out a bark of laughter. A rat in a nearby gutter stood on its back legs to look at her and then fled down a drainpipe.

“I think she would be, if she could feel anything other than hunger.”

“And....you?” Corvo asked, somehow even more afraid of this answer than the other. Grim Alex he could fight. Drea, he had no idea what to do with. He didn’t dare look at her, but out of the corner of his eye he saw her shake her head.

“It doesn’t matter what the rest of me feels once that part of me has become involved.”

A part of him said: _It matters to me if you want me._ A part of him said: _I am tired of fighting and running and want it be over._ A part of him said: _I don’t know how to open up without force and violence._

What he actually said aloud was, “But are you going to _do_ it? It doesn’t matter what you think . What matters is if you _act_ on it.”

He expected an angry response, but perhaps that was unfair of him. That was what Grim Alex would have done. Drea just sighed.

“Until this week, I would have said I’d never act on those thoughts again, but here we are. I don’t know how to judge the risk anymore.”

“Do you think this way about Aramis?”

She snorted, as though this were a silly question. “No. I love him even when I’m feeling envious.”

“What about the staff? Jaime, Manny, Fernando, Cathy, Betsan and the others?”

“Passing thoughts,” she admitted. “Nothing like this.”

“Then is there anyone but me that you think this about?”

Out of the corner of his eye, he saw her shake her head.

“Then the only one at risk is me, and I also happen to be the only one trained to be able to handle you if you relapse. That seems convenient, doesn’t it? But if you leave and meet someone else you desire....” He trailed off, leaving the possibility open for her to interpret.

“I would have thought you’d be eager to get rid of me,” she muttered, stopping at a street corner so he had to stop too. Then, louder, “You’re afraid all the time, always looking for things that are wrong and dangerous. And that’s _me!”_ She gestured at herself, hands tense over her chest. “But now you want me back?”

Corvo fully intended to say nothing and wait her out as usual, but after a few seconds she growled, smacking his chest with the back of her hand. His arm automatically came up to seize her wrist, body reacting to _threat_ without his mind’s intervention.

“I may desire you, but I am tired of your bullshit, Corvo,” she told him, voice hard--but her eyes were still their normal hazel. “I know you think a lot behind that handsome face of yours, and this is not a situation for your cautious silence. If you want me to return, I need to know why.”

He shook off her touch, hating that she was forcing this issue--and yet a part of him was grateful. For one second, two, he wanted to pull even further away, deny her the victory, fight back against any attempt to get information from him. But a part of him _wanted_ to be forced to talk. He had refused to do it all those months in Coldridge, and then held his tongue for decades in court--so perhaps he was ready now. Perhaps he’d finally given up, just like the torturer wanted. Or maybe it was just that she wanted the truth, not terrible lies, and Corvo had wanted to tell the truth the whole time.

“I would miss you if you were gone,” Corvo admitted at last, mortified and feeling his face heat as he did so. “My daughter doesn’t need me anymore, and it....it feels like a family, with the three of us together in Aramis’ house. I’m tired of losing family.”

Her face went soft, greenish eyes looking right into him even if he didn’t look back. “Is that what you think?” she asked, gentle.

He refused to repeat it and just let out a sullen huff instead. And she _laughed_ at him, tapping her finger against his breastbone where she’d just slapped at him.

 _“There_ you are again, the walled-off man I know. I was wondering if a cooperative stranger had temporarily occupied your face.”

They walked back to Lucia’s house together in silence, and for once the lack of conversation made Corvo very uncomfortable. He kept wondering if he ought to say something more and then biting his tongue. The sensation was so unfamiliar that it made him jittery and he dug his nails into his palms and scanned the walls, the rooftops, the alleys around them, searching for unwelcome faces and movement. But all there were was rats, peering at him from their little enclosed spaces at the edges of things.

When they reached Lucia’s door, Drea laid a hand on his shoulder.

“I need time to think. Even if....even if the only person with anything to fear from me is you, that still matters to me.” Drea seemed to steel herself, straightening to her full height and looking Corvo in the face. He looked back, palms sweating. “If I feel safe, I’ll come back. If not, I’ll find my own lodgings.” She squeezed the meat of his arm, offering something to him with the gesture, but he didn’t know what. “Thank you for coming here, Corvo. I’m touched that you showed me this much of you.”

Then she vanished into Lucia’s apartment, closing the door after her.

**

That night, when Aramis and Corvo had retreated to one of the parlors with wine and a book to read together, Corvo found himself anxious and unable to settle, thinking about Drea and Aramis and other things he shouldn’t care about but did, far too much. After Corvo’s second glass--Corvo saw Aramis glance at him in concern as Corvo went to pour the third--Corvo laid his hand over the page. Aramis turned to look at him, eyes inquisitive, and Corvo ground his teeth, knowing he had set himself up to say something and hating himself for it.

“Is there someone else you desire?” he gritted out at last. Aramis’ face became an immediate picture of surprise.

“What on earth do you mean?”

“You offered that I could sleep with others. That means there must be others you wish to sleep with as well.”

Rather than seeming nervous or guilty, Aramis broke into laughter, grinning wide. Corvo scowled.

“Is _that_ what concerns you so much about it? That my attention might wander?”

Corvo tried to wait Aramis out, forcing him to explain himself, but all he did was stare at Corvo with a half-smile, eyes traveling over Corvo’s face as though he were a beautiful thing. It made Corvo so uncomfortable he played himself at his own game.

“If it is not that, then you must think so little of me that you believe I can’t restrain myself with others. Or do you think you’re not enough to hold my attention?” Corvo narrowed his eyes at Aramis, hoping to communicate his seriousness, but Aramis only shook his head with a soft smile.

Picking the bookmark up from where he’d laid it on the end-table, Aramis carefully marked his place and set the book aside, pushing away his glass of wine to do so. Then he turned on the couch where they sat together in their stocking-feet, leaning forward to take Corvo’s hands. He pressed a tender kiss to Corvo’s cheek and when he withdrew Corvo stared at him, confused by this response.

“You used to be the Imperial Spymaster, Corvo. You’re able to read people. So tell me: what do I think of you?”

Aramis’ eyes were all earnest openness as he looked at Corvo. Corvo turned away, baffled and angry, and knew this was how people felt about _him_ when he refused to answer. But Aramis only squeezed Corvo’s hands, coming in closer still and leaning their faces together.

“I think you know what I feel, _acushla._ Is it not obvious by now?”

The warmth of the words touched Corvo’s mouth, immediate and real from this close. Corvo resisted responding for as long as he could, but finally he had to accept that Aramis had outmaneuvered him.

“You love me,” Corvo admitted at last, unwilling yet unable to deny the truth of it any longer. “I....I don’t understand why. Or why you’d try to--to give me away, if that were the case.”

This only earned Corvo another huff of amusement, and Aramis releasing Corvo’s hands to pull him in close until Corvo was forced to climb into Aramis’ lap, just as he had that first night they kissed here. Corvo let himself be pulled in and held despite the tension along his spine telling him to run, run, run.

“You don’t understand why I would love someone who survived the Imperial Court for so many decades and came away still caring about others?” Aramis murmured. “Politics eat the gentle, Corvo, and they’ve had their teeth in you. I was lost in all that for years, trying to impress the very people who scorned and undermined me. You, though--they’ve betrayed you in the worst possible ways, and you came out of it still human, having raised a beautiful daughter who can follow in both her parents’ footsteps with pride.” Corvo swallowed hard, his right hand spasming on Aramis’ shoulder. “Have you forgotten that I loved Theodanis, too, and saw him struggle and fail to be half the parent you’ve been even _despite_ what the Court did to you?”

“That wasn’t, I didn’t--” Corvo protested, desperate now to reject Aramis’ words. He had deceived Aramis somehow and had to make it right. “So many others were involved in raising Emily. Her mother, her governess Callista, and Sokolov, and--”

“And yet she takes after you and Jessamine,” Aramis interrupted. “Emily writes to me often, you know, and is very open in her letters. I haven’t the foggiest what I did to deserve the confidence she places in me, but it means I have an unusually clear window into the Empress’ mind. So many of your best qualities you passed along to her.”

A choked breath escaped Corvo at this, his chest aching with a kind of miserable gratitude for the words. At the same time, he couldn’t help but wonder where on earth those letters were, as he had never seen a single trace of them. But the need to refute Aramis swirled into and around Corvo’s equally strong desire for Aramis to be right.

“I failed her,” Corvo confessed, for once unable to _stop_ himself from speaking, “and she sent me away. I failed her mother, too, just like I’ve already failed Drea and I’ll fail you too if you let me stay--”

Aramis shook his head before turning his face up to press a kiss to Corvo’s mouth to stop him. Corvo shut up, grateful for the interruption.

“Even the very best of people fail sometimes, and it does not make them less good,” Aramis told him, and Corvo did not understand how such an intelligent man could be so wrong.

“Every newspaper in the Empire talks about the failed Royal Protector who allowed not one but two Empresses to be deposed and replaced,” Corvo argued, bitter and tired.

“And yet the few people who actually know you love you deeply. What do you think _that_ says about you?” Aramis replied, cupping one hand around Corvo’s jaw. Corvo wasn’t sure why he allowed it, why he was allowing any of this charade of safety. But his desire to believe Aramis’ words was so great that Corvo wondered if _this_ was what the Abbey meant by the temptation of the Lying Tongue.

“My point is that I don’t think ill of you,” Aramis went on. “You are not a man for faithlessness. And I think you know me well enough by now to know that I like providing for those I care about. This country, this district, the miners, my friends, and you. Alexandria may or may not come back, and if she doesn’t, then I will help her buy a house somewhere nearby so I can still see her. Why would I not want to give you _both_ every good thing? If that includes each other, then so much the better for me.”

“How has the world not crushed this out of you yet,” Corvo asked, exhausted by his own credulity.

“Luck, perhaps,” Aramis admitted, “and the aid of people who care for me. So let me give back some of what was given to me.”

“I would not be able to bear it if you took up with someone else,” Corvo admitted.

“Just how many men do you think are beating upon my door wanting to fuck me?” Aramis asked, smiling again as if this were funny to him.

Corvo scowled again. He could not mention the dirty letters he’d found in Aramis’ secret compartment of his desk, nor could he explain that he had met the tobacconist and spied upon his secret gathering. So Corvo remained silent rather than incriminate himself.

“In the interests of full honesty, there are a few men with whom I am casually acquainted who would be willing with sleep with me again, if I asked.” Corvo tensed, his suspicions confirmed, and braced his hands on Aramis’ shoulders to push away. But Aramis only shook his head, stroking across Corvo’s sides with his thumbs and holding him in place. “How many of those men do you see visiting me regularly? How many do you see living in my home?”

The answer was mortifyingly obvious: none. Aramis was close with his housekeeper, Jaime, but while Jaime’s loyalty was unshakable, the man was courting a local woman and Corvo had found no evidence whatsoever that Jaime was anything but a friend and employee. And while Aramis visited other friends occasionally or received visitors into the house, none were anything like so close to Aramis as Corvo himself--or Drea. Aramis had silvergraphs of himself with the same woman who had helped Emily during the coup, Meagan Foster, but Meagan had disappeared after bringing Emily to Dunwall. Corvo knew for a fact that Foster’s absence worried Aramis, who missed her--but as a woman, Foster could not possibly be a competitor either.

“There are many things about you that I don’t know,” Corvo stated, sullen and self-conscious now. “I didn’t realize that you and Emily wrote to each other so much.”

This earned Corvo yet another laugh. “Yes, she told me that you could be a bit overbearing with concern for her, so she set up a private mail delivery for me outside the house and told me not to tell you about it, which I guess I just failed at. Our correspondence is delivered in locked containers, too, that only we know the codes to open, and the letters are even then sealed with wax to ensure they are not tampered with en-route. She told me to store the correspondence in my bank deposit box if I wished to keep it. Like I said, she is very much like you.”

Corvo had to admit that he was impressed that Emily had been writing to his lover without Corvo himself finding out about it. Impressed and irritated, and concerned that she felt the need to go to such lengths to ensure he wouldn’t read whatever she was writing. The locked metal tubes used to transmit the Empress’ personal correspondence were standard procedure, and he used them himself to speak to her with relative candor, but still it was another sign of how little she trusted him now. Wanting to get away from this discomfiting topic, Corvo had no choice but to turn back to to his initial concern.

“It’s not fair, though. If I sleep with someone else but cannot bear you doing the same.”

Aramis only smiled again. “Perhaps not. So what about this: if I find some other handsome, intelligent man who returns my interest, I will tell you, and you and I can deal with it then. And in the meantime, you will continue to have my full attention.”

Corvo still hated the idea of Aramis with anyone else, but the offer was nonetheless equitable and just. When Corvo couldn't fault with this response and didn’t want to continue to sit in the parlor feeling embarrassed and distracted, he took Aramis to bed and sucked him till Corvo’s jaw hurt and the hair at the base of Aramis’ cock was wet and curling. When Aramis afterward wanted Corvo to lie back, spread his legs, and let Aramis bring him to an extravagant climax, well. Corvo didn’t say no.

He liked the way Aramis made him feel. He was starting to think he liked the way he seemed to make Aramis feel, too.

If afterward Corvo’s mind wandered to Drea, wondering what she was doing and if she would return to the household, that was for Corvo to know.

**

A week later Alexandria walked in after her work day, her clothes dirty from the clinic and her suitcase hanging heavy from her hand. She subsequently came to dinner in a fresh shirt and breeches, and aside from the fact that she had more than a week of stories from the clinic to tell them, it was as though she had never been gone.

The next day--her day off, the only one she took most weeks--she found Corvo in his study in the evening, writing inquiries about local Overseer activity. Talk of the Abbey investigating Stilton’s house had increased, and Corvo wanted to head it off before it got any worse. He didn’t see ‘ghosts’ here as other people seemed to, and wondered if it was some result of what Delilah had done to him in removing the Mark. Aramis saw them, but seemed relatively unbothered. Perhaps Emily had written to Aramis explaining the disturbance and thus he was not frightened by it, knowing its source. Or perhaps Aramis simply refused to leave the house where he had spent so long with Theodanis.

“Come with me to the back garden,” Drea demanded, and Corvo gave her a look. It was late winter, which in Karnaca didn’t mean very much when compared to Dunwall, but even so it meant going outside into the cold.

“If you have a complaint, make it,” she told him, “otherwise I will assume that you will meet me at the back door in five minutes.” And she raised her eyebrows at him in challenge.

Five minutes later he met her at the door. She nodded at him, curling her hand through his arm and leading him out. The wind roared over the walls of the windbreak and the chill nipped at Corvo’s face, but this was still milder than spring in Dunwall.

“I have something indelicate to ask you. I know you will hate it,” Drea began as soon as they were away from the house. Corvo chewed at his lip where the skin was try and peeling. A month ago her pronouncement would not have concerned him aside from the irritation of having to hear the question at all. Now he worried that she might actually get him to answer.

“When I return to myself after being Alex,” Drea began, and Corvo drew a slow breath through his nose, the air burning in his sinuses and keeping him alert. “I only get bits and pieces of the memories back later. And with you, I only remember....” Corvo couldn’t help the way he tensed, arms drawing in toward his body, hands flexing in his gloves. She turned to face him. “I remember you hard underneath me, letting me do what I wanted,” she murmured, words and eyes gentle as though worried he would spook like a horse and run. He wanted to. “You said that you had to get me back to the manor, so I understand why you would go along with her--with _my_ wishes to some degree. But you are not a passive man, so why did you….”

She trailed off. Corvo ground his teeth, not daring to turn fully away from her but not wanting her to see the heat spreading across his cheeks either. Only years of training kept his face and body still.

“I only wish to know how things stand between us,” she explained. “I understand that men often cannot help when they become erect, and that it is a physiological response that can be provoked even when a man does not want what is happening to him. I am not reading anything into you being hard.” He scowled at her, unable to believe they were discussing his genitals out in the damned garden, or indeed anywhere at all. Why couldn’t they have done this inside? Why did they need to do this at all? Yes, his body was treacherous just like everything else in this cursed world, and while that shouldn’t have been a surprise to anyone, none of it was her business.

“It’s the fact that you were so pliant that scares me,” she went on. “I know I shouldn’t dwell on it, but I keep thinking that you must have been afraid _any_ resistance would provoke violence. So I have to wonder: are you afraid of me like that _all_ the time?” At this he shook his head, denying the idea. She pursed her lips, clearly disbelieving. “Is it healthy for you to be around me at all? If you’re tense and unhappy near me, if you’re afraid, then--”

“I meant what I said the other day,” he interrupted. “If I wished you to leave, believe me that I would have just let you go. Or arranged for it to happen sooner.” He half wished he had, now, so that he wouldn’t need to have this or any other awkward conversations.

“So you were trying to lull me into believing I’d won?” she pushed, refusing to leave it alone. Probably she just wanted reassurance that she hadn’t really harmed him, which he understood, but he didn’t want to give it. He wondered if there were some disease of the mind that would explain his reaction to Grim Alex, the intermingled desire to die and to let her do whatever she wanted to him. Perhaps Drea would know.

“If I hadn’t known you were not yourself,” he gritted out, stomach aching tight with the wrongness of voicing this, “I would have let you do whatever you wanted to me. I wanted it.”

“But you were so afraid,” Drea denied, shaking her head at him. “I remember that. I don’t remember how I knew but I remember knowing that you were frightened.”

“I was,” Corvo admitted. “I still am.” His lips bunched together with the disgust of what he was about to say. “Perhaps there is something wrong with me like there was something wrong with you.”

For several long moments she blinked at him. Then she let out a little huff of amusement or surprise, one corner of her mouth turning up.

“Some humans have paradoxical responses to pain and fear, you know,” she told him, as though this were a bit of scientific information no more inflammatory than the fact that certain chemicals reacted when in contact with water. Corvo stared down at her, eyes narrowing, but Drea just gave him a shy smile. “Sokolov and Joplin conducted interviews with clientele in brothels, and some subjects described experiencing sexual arousal in circumstances of pain or fear. The Abbey wanted to burn Anton alive for it and they suppressed the publication, but I hear they also used Sokolov and Joplin’s findings as proof of the Outsider’s evil influence and began testing for signs of such ‘corruption’ in their prisoners. So.”

Corvo wondered what the Outsider would say if Corvo were to find a shrine and touch the offerings there. Probably nothing useful if he showed himself at all, just more of his cryptic and condescending blather. Corvo had made a point not to search for any shrines since Delilah removed the Mark, not wanting to draw the Outsider’s attention a second time. And it was not as though the Outsider would have appeared to a lot of brothel clients to Mark all of them, so perhaps contact with the Outsider had nothing to do with this after all. But Corvo didn’t like to think he had anything in common with the sorts of people who frequented brothels, either.

“So are you saying that you were afraid of me, but also enjoying that in some way?” Drea pressed, and Corvo flinched, then grimaced.

“I don’t know,” he bit out. “I should have hated it. And you weren’t yourself.”

“No, I wasn’t,” she told him, voice gentle. “And that makes it especially important that I know how you respond to me. Because if I’m able to manipulate you by offering you something you want--”

“No,” he denied, this time able to be firm in his response. “I’m not a child. I’m capable of seeing something I want without needing to have it.”

Her eyebrows lifted into an expression of surprise. “Wait--are you saying you’re interested in _me?_ Or just the sorts of things we did?”

Corvo looked at her. The evening light masked the lines on her face and the white in her hair, and she looked younger than her years. She was beautiful now, and must have been very desired in her youth in the Academy. He could only imagine how all the other natural philosophers must vied for her attention.

She must have seen something of the thought in his face, because she reached out and squeezed his bicep with her hand. Perhaps she meant it as support, perhaps she just wanted to touch him.

“I thought it was just Aramis being selfless,” she said then. “You’re so closed-off that I assumed you couldn’t possibly be interested.”

He looked away, saying nothing, but right now even his silence spoke for him.

They stood for a while in the garden, neither of them seeming to know what remark to make after this revelation. Finally, to his own disgust, Corvo spoke.

“I wouldn’t have considered it if Aramis hadn’t put the thought in my mind,” he told her, hating how petulant he sounded but needing her to understand that he wasn’t one of those awful people who couldn’t keep their hands to themselves when committed to someone else.

“I’m not sure it’s a good idea at all,” she told him, seeming to ignore his words. Her hand slid down to his forearm where it tightened. “What if I relapse again? Sexual activity might well provoke that mindset in me.”

Corvo refused to open his mouth anymore lest anything embarrassing fall out of it again, so he just looked at her, waiting for her to elaborate.

“You know I’m interested,” she said, and he almost admired the shamelessness of the statement. It seemed so easy for her to admit. “And since we’re being blunt, then I can tell you that I am able to self-stimulate without causing an incident. But as you already know, you provoke a particular response in me. Given what already occurred, tempting fate any further seems unwise.”

He agreed. And if it was only him and Aramis, then he had less cause to worry about Aramis choosing someone else instead of him. So Corvo just tilted his head, listening as she voiced her thoughts.

“I wish I had met you earlier in my life,” she admitted. “Four years ago, before all this happened, I could have been good to you. If it had been you instead of Meo….” Her voice wobbled, soft and damp with unshed tears. “He was like you, I think. Long before I created the serum he wanted to know all about the parts of me that weren’t polite or kind or good. Before the serum, we’d played at cruelty just for fun, but it had all been just play-acting, not....” she cut off the thought there, and Corvo wondered what horrors she was remembering. “But he brought out the sweetness in me too. I had imagined marrying him one day, pictured us having a rose garden and making discoveries together. Which....was probably why I destroyed him, in the end. I think Alex knew I didn’t deserve him anymore.”

Corvo didn’t know what to say. He’d struggled with knowing how to offer comfort even to Emily, whom he knew better than anyone else in the world. When she had been self-doubting and conflicted after her return from Karnaca he had tried his best, fumbling through reassurance, feeling as he always did that he was failing her as a father yet again.

“I imagine you know a lot about regrets,” Drea told him then, and at this Corvo let out a snort of disbelief: of course he did. It got a crooked half-smile from her in return, but she shook her head. “I’m glad of what your daughter did to Luca. I wouldn’t have had as much restraint in her position.”

 _Neither would I,_ Corvo thought. The Overseers he’d killed several weeks ago had been far too satisfying, and he hadn’t even been hurt by them personally.

Corvo let himself think about Alexandria’s future and sighed. He knew all about resigning oneself to a lifetime of celibacy because of fear. That he found himself in this position instead--with one established and trustworthy lover and talking to a beautiful woman who in other circumstances could have been something to him--astonished Corvo.

Drea let out an extended sigh, sounding exhausted, and she scrubbed her hands over her face. “My work is good. It’s right, and I feel right doing it. Most days, I can believe it’s enough. But when I look at you and Aramis together, I remember what it was like to have _more_ than just work. To have someone waiting for me at the end of the day, loving me....and then I feel angry and unhappy and envious. I almost decided not to come back.”

He nodded at this too. He hadn’t expected her to return, not really. He couldn’t offer any real safeguards or promises.

“This would all be much easier if we had some sort of controlled environment in which....to....” and then she trailed off, pressing one hand to her mouth. Corvo turned to her, one eyebrow raised, and she looked back, wide-eyed.

“You would tell me if what I’m saying sounds too much like her, right? If I’m being selfish or dangerous?”

He stared at her in open concern but he also gave her a cautious nod. For several moments he waited for her to talk, and then watched in disbelief as a pink tinge swept up over her face and she shuffled from foot to foot. Corvo’s eyebrows climbed up toward his hairline.

“If you--” she began, and then turned around, crossing her arms over her chest. Corvo curled his own hands behind him in parade rest--he’d waited his way through worse things than this.

“If you tied me down,” she began, and he stared hard at her back, not encouraged by this beginning. “We could test to see if I’m dangerous. If sex causes me to relapse or if it’s only exposure to Crown Killer crime scenes.”

Well, having an inopportune erection wouldn’t be a problem then, Corvo supposed, since the idea of binding a woman for his own sexual purposes did not interest him at all. She looked over her shoulder at him, anxiety writ into her expression, and he gave her an acquiescing shrug. As unappealing as the scenario was, he couldn’t deny that it would at least answer some questions. And if it led to anything better down the line....well.

“Is it wrong for me to ask you that?” She came back over to him, reaching out as if to touch him and then pulling her hands away again. He shook his head. “It would have to be something very strong to actually contain me. Manacles and chain might work--or a position in which I have no leverage.”

Corvo couldn’t quite believe he was entertaining this notion, but he was. The thought of Drea being unhappy upset him in turn. He detested the idea of her sitting in quiet envy and resignation as he was enjoying himself with Aramis.

“I’ll look into it,” he said, and then watched with some amusement as she became flustered and apologetic.

**

Every part of the acquisition of manacles and chains felt ridiculous to Corvo. He felt ridiculous making the inquiries, he felt ridiculous paying the blacksmith, he felt ridiculous carrying the heavy package home. Over and over again he told himself that this was an unreasonable use of time and coin, far too much effort for something that would doubtless ruin the good situation he had with Aramis and possibly even provoke unnecessary danger for both himself and Drea. The only comforting thought was that if he brought ruin into his life by doing this, at least there would only be a few months left in Karnaca to stew in the loss before he returned to Dunwall for good. So really, there was not all that much to lose. A few months of pleasure was very little in the greater scope of his life.

But if this succeeded....well. Corvo felt the most ridiculous of all for the fact that he thought this had any chance of success. That he might desire to have any sort of intimacy with the _Crown Killer_ was sick, but he was already _living_ with her, _friends_ with her, so. Surely if there were any moral complaint to be made about connection with her, it could be made just as much for social intercourse as sexual.

And he did find himself hopeful, despite common sense and his own experience telling him that the opposite was far more likely. Probably they would try this ridiculous thing, she would relapse again, and this time would leave the house permanently. Probably after all this he would wish that he had left well enough alone.

That evening after dinner he briefly stepped into the parlor with Aramis to communicate his intended plans with Drea. Hot-faced, he answered Aramis’ concerned questions about their safety. But the man seemed satisfied that if Alexandria was consenting and Corvo was sure of his own capacity to protect himself, that all would be well. With a kiss, Aramis wished them both good luck, and Corvo went back into the hall in a state of disbelief that any of this was real.

Then he brought the jingling cloth satchel to Drea’s rooms, where she met him at the door with an anxious expression.

“Are you sure?” she asked. “This is not necessary, I want you to know that--”

Corvo stared her down until she fell silent. He found it beyond ironic that _she_ was the one concerned about being selfish; he already had a generous lover, what did he need another for? Yet here he was. And when she held her wrists out behind her, he fastened her arms together there, hooking the key to the same harness that held his bone charms. They both considered the other manacles then, as he had gotten ones for both her hands and her feet.

“Any sign of Alex yet?” he asked, not sure if the question was joking or serious. She shook her head, looking anxious, brow furrowed. Corvo could not remember any other sexual encounter that had been this awkward and fraught.

After some debate, they decided against confining her legs, so he laid the extra cuffs and chains out on her desk on top of the messy sprawl of papers there.

“Well then,” she cleared her throat. “How about we start with a kiss?”

An easy enough demand, Corvo supposed. But when he approached her, bending to bring his face near hers, she did not close the rest of the distance. Instead she opened her mouth and took in a deep breath, scenting the air near his face.

“He kissed you before you came here,” she murmured, eyes half-lidded. “He had the redfin for dinner, you had lamb, but I can smell fish on your mouth.”

A ripple of sensation passed over Corvo, spreading from his nape down his arms. His fingers twitched where they hovered near his sides, and he moved even closer to her. Any slight shift now would bring them together.

“Open,” she told him, and he obeyed. When she closed the distance, she drew his lower lip in between her own, teeth scraping over it before she soothed it with her tongue.

The desire which had vacated the room with the safety precautions rushed back, sweeping over Corvo in a wave. He lost himself in the kiss, the bite of her teeth and the exploration of her tongue, until he found his hands gripping into the loose fabric of her clothes. He didn’t remember putting them there.

“Open my shirt,” she told him, and he obeyed. His right hand couldn’t manage tasks that fine anymore, especially not with buttons this small, so he did it left-handed. Underneath she wore a sensible linen vest for support, and Corvo undid the laces at the sides of that, too. Tentative now, watching her face for disapproval, he slid his left hand up underneath her clothes until the tip of his thumb pressed into the lower curve of her breast. She grinned, lamplight glittering on her teeth, so he grew braver, pushing higher up until she filled the palm of his hand. The skin was soft and thin, yielding as he swept his thumb up over it until he ran into the hard nub of her nipple.

“The other side too,” she instructed, and then arched her back into his grasp when he complied, rough palms catching on the fine hairs along her sides. He let out a shuddery breath against Drea’s cheek, at once stunned by both the sudden renewed rush of desire he felt and the unavoidable memories of Jessamine.

He had spent so long convinced there would never be another woman after Jessamine--that there would never be _anyone_ after her. She had been his whole world for two decades, and Emily after her passing. That Corvo instead found himself here, breathing in the warm human scent of another woman as her ribs moved under his fingers, his other lover aware and accepting across the house and all three of them far from Dunwall in the place of his birth....it beggared belief. He had been meant to die in Coldridge, in the Flooded District, in Delilah’s stolen throne room. When he had been working for the Loyalists, he had been so certain of his own end that he had set aside money in advance to pay the palace coroner to secretly lay his bones beside Jessamine’s. Corvo hadn’t ever been meant to wind up here, trying to keep his damaged right hand from slipping as he explored the pebbled texture of Drea’s areolas.

She bit at his mouth again until it stung, doubtless red and swollen. When she tired of this, she backed them toward the bed. Corvo allowed himself to be pushed, sinking onto the mattress when it hit the back of his knees.

“Now my breeches,” Drea purred, and it was frighteningly easy to comply. Unlike her shirt, which couldn’t be removed around the manacles, her breeches slid easily down her legs. That left only the thin shield of her linen underthings, and the immediate flood of musk from them dampened his doubts as his mouth filled with saliva. His tongue flexed automatically against his hard palate, heat prickling under his clothes.

“May I....” he started to ask as she shook one leg to rid herself of her outer clothes and then kicked them away. She grinned down at him again, watching him struggle to breathe around the blissful smell of her. He couldn’t imagine what it must be like for her own nose, keen as it was, if it was this good for him. Being with Aramis had reminded him how much he loved sucking cock, but nothing compared to the vivid scent of a woman ready for his touch.

She nodded when he pulled at the drawstring of her pantalettes, the thin fabric collapsing along her hips before she leaned her weight on one side and the pantalettes fell down around her ankles, revealing the rich black thatch between her thighs.

Corvo couldn’t help himself from bending forward to nuzzle into the silky fold where her thigh met the mound of her sex, but he looked up at her in deference as he did so, worried this might displease her. Her shoulders flexed under her shirt, eyes bright and intent as she watched, but she only tilted her pelvis up to meet him. Corvo sighed open-mouthed onto her, letting the heat inside him meet the heat of her, suffusing the small pocket of space between them. She let out a sound of smug delight.

“Get down on the bed and I’ll let you have what you want,” she instructed, and Corvo shuffled away across the covers at once. A flare of warning rose at the back of his mind, reminding him that even shackled, this was still the Crown Killer. But her eyes were their usual hazel, and while she looked pleased and confident, he hoped it meant nothing more than her feeling flattered by his obvious desire for her.

Corvo paused only for a moment to shuck off his boots, tossing them over the bedside before laying out for her. Because of her bound arms, getting into place over him was more difficult than it should have been. But it meant that when Corvo lifted his arms to steady her, he got to feel her thick, hard thighs flexing as she lowered herself.

If the smell of her had been potent before, it was overpowering now, caged in between her thighs as the concealing curls parted to reveal what lay within. He wanted to drown in her, dropping his jaw as she sank down so his tongue slid right into her, frictionless and tasting like the sea.

Time dilated as he lost himself in the dark warmth, his world stretching out to hold this experience. Dimly he became aware of his cock trapped under his clothes, aching for touch so that his own hips rocked back and forth in echo of hers. But that was secondary to the hard little shape of her pearl in his mouth. He lapped at it, over and over and over again until her juices flowed down over his chin and neck, thick and viscous as whale oil. With a growl she ground down onto him, rocking herself onto his tongue and forward against his lips and nose. He could barely breathe, gasping in ragged breaths during the brief moments she withdrew. He remembered her hands on his throat, digging into his pulse, her marks on his skin from her teeth--this time he’d wear her scent rather than her bruises. He could feel his heartbeat in his cock, his fingers sinking into the muscle of her hips as he held her there.

Drea groaned her pleasure, long notes of approval and praise as she took and took and took what he so badly wanted to give. He forgot to listen to the sounds of the house, too intent on the rising pitch of her voice, the sudden stillness of her hips as he sucked at her and swirled around the tip just as he did for Aramis.

The metal of the shackles clanked as she stilled above him, and that was all the warning he got before she came. The squeeze and flutter of her around his tongue and the silky strength of her thighs around him transported Corvo back through time to stolen hours with Jessamine and how much he had loved to do this for her. They had both been shyer of having him inside her after the birth, counting the days of her cycles and finding as many other forms of pleasure with each other as they could.

When Drea pulled away, falling back against his chest and shoulders, it was like breaking through the surface of deep water. Corvo lay gasping and blinded by the lights.

“You’re so good at that,” Drea praised, lazy hazel eyes regarding him as he stared upward. “I could have you every morning and every night and not get tired of that tongue.” But then she looked away, belly rising and falling once, twice, three times in harsh gasps, and the mirth dropped out of her features.

“Corvo are you--was that--” her eyes pleaded with him.

He smiled. His beard and mustache smelled of her, the collar of his shirt probably smelled like her, and he lifted his arms to cradle the base of her spine in his arms. Grief for the loss of Jessamine swam somewhere under his breastbone, but that was always there, and in this moment, at least, he could believe that she would have wanted him to be happy. That wherever she was now, she might find some relief in knowing he hadn’t lost the capacity for love along with his Empress. If Jessamine were alive, she would have loved Aramis and Drea too, good people in a world where that was a rarity.

“I am well,” he slurred, mouth half-numb from use. “I am very well.”

With a shy smile in return, Drea dismounted from his chest, fumbling and wobbling her way down onto the bed beside him. He moved aside so that she could seat herself against the headboard.

“So what can I do for you?” she asked, motioning downward with her chin at where he made a clear lump in his trousers. “Normally I’d use my hands, but....”

He didn’t care. He had gotten what he wanted, and though his cock ached a bit now, that would go away if they let it. So he rolled himself up onto his hands and knees, then leaned forward to kiss her.

She smiled into his mouth, licking into his lips and nosing into his beard. “You smell like me now. I can’t tell you how satisfying that is.”

Privately he agreed. The knowledge that she would be able to detect herself on him, maybe even for days, did something to him low in his gut that rippled outward till he twitched, sensitive skin of his cock rubbing against his clothes.

Catching his lip between her teeth to get him to stay still, Corvo felt one of her legs move under him. A flash of anxiety went through him--if she bit down, she could tear his face open or kick him between the legs while he was unable to escape. But she did neither of those things, and instead her toes pushed and spread over the shaft of his prick, rubbing him through his clothes.

“I have slick in my bedside table,” she murmured against his stinging mouth when she let him go. “If you get undressed and rub some into my feet, we’ll see what I can do without my hands.”

She must have felt the way he twitched against the sole of her foot, because she laughed. This--it was another thing Corvo should have hated but didn’t. And since she’d already seen the full extent of his scarring, there was no point in modesty. He at least remembered to lay his clothes out over a chair, and he’d had the foresight this time to put the most necessary bone charm on a ribbon around his neck.

When he turned back to the bed, she grinned up at him, flexing her feet suggestively until her eyes fell with interest on the charm. But as she didn’t ask, he didn’t say anything, so with a keen sense of his own ridiculousness, he opened the bedside drawer.

“The black jar,” she told him. “Something of my own formulation.”

When he dipped his fingers into the jar, he found a smooth, oily substance that thinned and grew even slicker with the warmth of his skin. Hardly believing he was doing this, he seated himself on the bed by her legs and drew one foot toward him, stroking along the arch and up between her toes with slippery fingers. Her smile widened, lines around her eyes deepening.

Corvo had rubbed Jessamine’s feet many times, especially during her pregnancy when her ankles had swollen and her legs ached, but that had never been with intent to make it anything else. Yet once he’d spread the oil onto Drea’s sole, she lifted her leg and slid it between his thighs, pressing her heel against the shaft until he couldn’t help but squirm up into it. It wasn’t exactly a dextrous touch, but worked up as he already was, it didn’t need to be. And she watched him, eyes intent and arms shifting so the manacles clicked against the wood of the headboard. Her hungry gaze traveled over his body as she curled her toes around him, the calluses rough against his sensitive flesh.

It was humiliating how he reacted, heat washing up over his neck and face as he squirmed against her. He dropped his chin, letting his hair fall over his face, trying to hide from the way she looked at him. Her calf flexed against his left hand and he slid neatly into the space between her big toe and the smaller one beside it, the others splaying down the shaft. The tight unyielding squeeze of it around him was damn near perfect, not unlike sliding into someone’s ass, and all it took was pushing down with his hand to make it into a tight ring for him to move through. A groan escaped him and a low chuckle from her, and somehow the sheer shame of it made it better. He rocked into the pressure and slickness, pleasure blooming up through him like blood in water, spreading and spreading till it suffused all through him, coloring him bright.

He came with a whimper, gripping her ankle and shaking, shaking, shaking, shoulders hunched forward and head hanging.

“Gorgeous,” she crooned, and pulled her leg away to cross it over her other knee. The indelicate movement against his oversensitized nerves drew a gasp from him. “Now get a cloth from the drawer too and clean us up,” she directed.

He wasn’t sure he could stand, limbs weak and coltish, but he forced himself up anyway. The sticky oiliness between his legs would rapidly become intolerable, and he didn’t want Drea staining the fine fabric of her covers, either. So after he had taken care of himself, he found himself rubbing her feet again, this time with terrycloth. She grinned at him when he dared to look at her face.

“Come here and let me kiss you,” she told him, and obedience seemed easy by now, so he went. She was gentler this time, all soft press of their mouths together. But he still caught her sniffing at him, doubtless enjoying the evidence she’d left.

At last, though, she leaned her forehead on his shoulder and sighed, breath chilly against his bare torso.

“I’m still me, right?” she asked, tone plaintive and vulnerable. “And you’re not hurt?”

Worming his hand up under her shirt, he squeezed at her side.

“I am fine,” he told her. “I could stand to do this again,” he added, feeling generous, but his neck grew overwarm where the back of his hair fell on it.

“High praise, coming from you,” she snarked at him, but he he could tell she was doing it to disguise her own anxiety. “I’ve never been the one tied up during sex before. Can’t say I like it much, but seeing you at my feet like that was an unexpected benefit.”

His cheeks burned.

“I wish all my experiments were this successful,” she whispered, and it ought to have been a joke but it wasn’t. Corvo stroked over her hipbone, her nape, up into her hair as her breathing roughened against his collarbone. He didn’t remark on it when he felt water catch in his chest hair, or when her back rippled with silent sobs, but he thought that they were both thinking of Addermire, and the serum, and everything she’d lost in those three years.

When at last her breathing slowed to normalcy again, he pulled away, rising to dress himself. When he was clothed, grimacing a little at the dampness of his own sweat in his shirt, he drew the key out and unlocked the heavy iron shackles from her wrists. She rubbed at the places the iron had been even though the metal had left no real marks, then rolled her shoulders. Shrugging out of her shirt at last, her breasts tightened into hard peaks in the cool air of her room.

Corvo admired her in the lamplight, quietly delighted that he got to see all of her before he left. She caught him looking and gave him a watery smile.

“If you’re still interested tomorrow, you know where to find me,” she told him. He nodded and left. The latch closed behind him with a click.

Almost as soon as he was out of the room, the need to see Aramis expanded till Corvo could barely breathe, overwhelming everything else. Corvo found himself almost _sick_ with longing. Was this normal after a tryst with someone else? How was he supposed to know?

So he walked silent through the halls back to Aramis’ rooms. But when he arrived, Corvo froze outside the door. Was it bad form to go from one lover to the other like this? Surely it was wrong that sleeping with someone else would draw Corvo to Aramis this way. Would Aramis feel insulted? Probably he would be disgusted by the smell of Corvo at least, as it left no doubt whatsoever about Corvo’s activities.

With that in mind, Corvo returned to his own rooms, changing his clothes and scrubbing his face with a scented soap. He didn’t like losing the smell of her, and would have preferred to leave it till the morning. But as Corvo finished re-dressing, he was almost shaking with the need to see Aramis. He wracked his brain trying to determine why that should be--he had just seen the man earlier in the evening!

But the draw was irresistible regardless of its source. This time when he found himself at Aramis’ door he knocked. No sooner had it opened but Corvo pushed inside, barely shutting the door before he kissed Aramis and dug his fingers into the man’s dressing gown. Aramis stumbled as Corvo pulled them close, but Aramis lifted his arms to hold Corvo readily enough despite that.

It was like Corvo’s hunger in the days after his escape from Coldridge. He’d made himself sick eating every meal, half-starved and all the more voracious for it. Every mouthful, no matter how plain the food, had been pure hedonism. Tinned fish, warm fresh bread, crisp apples, salted butter, beer, and apricot tarts for dessert whenever he wished--he’d gone to bed with his belly aching every night, overful and protesting the excess. His appetite had only really become manageable after the Loyalists had poisoned him and sent him to the Flooded District. After that, Corvo had treated food with caution again just like in Coldridge, where any meal had carried the risk of containing drugs or spit.

Finally Aramis pushed away, cradling Corvo’s face between his hands.

“Are you all right? Is Drea all right?” Aramis asked, clearly worried now. Corvo tried to kiss him again, but Aramis firmed his grip, holding Corvo away with his forearms. “No, I would like an answer. Don’t try to distract me.”

Clearly Aramis had been talking to Drea in recent days. He hadn’t done that before Drea had started doing it to Corvo. He hated it. He loved it. They knew him too well.

Swallowing, Corvo nodded. “I’m fine. She’s--also fine. As well as she can be, given everything. She didn’t relapse.”

Corvo felt Aramis relax at that. Muscles softening, he leaned more fully into Corvo and allowed another brief kiss. Corvo’s heart beat and beat and beat under his clothes, too fast and too much. This was madness, pure foolishness. Corvo should never have slept with either of them. But it was also the best decision he’d made in a long time, too, and he would miss it terribly when he left.

“What is it you need, _acushla?”_ Aramis asked, all earnest concern as usual.

Corvo didn’t know how to answer that. He just needed Aramis. He wanted Aramis to fuck him, even if Corvo couldn’t come again tonight. Corvo tried to kiss him again, and this time Aramis let him. He let Corvo lick into his mouth, let him grip at Aramis’ nape and pull him close. Corvo could feel the sore spots on his lips where Drea had bitten him, and the feeling of Aramis touching those marks lit Corvo up like sparked whale oil.

When they finally separated again some minutes later, Corvo was panting. He wasn’t hard, probably couldn’t be again till tomorrow morning, but he wanted and wanted and wanted.

“I love you,” he confessed, and saw Aramis blink in shock. But then he smiled.

“I send you off to sleep with someone else and you come right back here with that,” he laughed. Corvo managed to suppress his wince at the bald statement, barely, but the half-forgotten shame resurged at that in a great wave. His hands dropped.

Aramis seemed to sense something of Corvo’s thoughts and pressed their cheeks together. “No, no, I don’t mean ill by it. It’s very flattering. I’m just surprised.” Aramis kissed by Corvo’s left eye, then his right, the gestures careful and reverent. “I love you too. I’m so glad Emily sent you to us.”

At this the shame only intensified. What was Corvo even doing? He should have just stayed in his own room. He shouldn’t have slept with Drea at all. He shouldn’t have slept with Aramis either. What had possessed him to say that, and at this moment? He might as well have gutted himself and laid his entrails on Aramis’ bedspread. Corvo’s love was a useless, disgusting thing to give. His attraction at least carried utility.

This time Aramis kissed him, soft and slow, but the joy had gone from it for Corvo, leaving only stickiness and embarrassment. When Corvo didn’t respond Aramis pulled away to examine him. Corvo looked at the floor.

“You don’t know what you need right now, do you,” Aramis said at last. “But you came here. So come, lie down with me.”

For want of any better ideas, Corvo obeyed. In the end, Aramis read aloud to him from a scientific journal no doubt belonging to Drea. The first article was about a new species discovered in Pandyssia by a recent expedition, and it reminded Corvo of Anton and all his stories, though the article lacked his wild crudity and grotesque sense of humor. The second was about a possible new subspecies of bloodfly being researched in the far west of Serkonos.

Corvo fell asleep without realizing it.

He awoke later to find Aramis sleeping beside him, one lamp still on. It had to be after midnight.

Only the house itself made noise as Corvo crept back to his own room. Curling into his cold sheets, he thought of taking the sleeping herbs again but instead stared at his own ceiling for over an hour.

Finally, he got up to fetch his soiled shirt from earlier and lay down with, it, breathing in Drea’s smell from the collar.

**

The next day, Corvo had no idea what to do with himself. He buried himself in his work out of sheer self-defense and went to dinner that evening with trepidation.

But the dinner was just like every other. Aramis inquired after Drea’s clients and work at the clinic, Drea inquired after the servants and the household tasks. They discussed literature and local gossip and Aramis’ investments. The only change was the smug smile Drea kept sending Corvo’s way.

It unsettled him. Was he supposed to respond to it in front of Aramis? And after dinner, who was he meant to go with? Was there a hierarchy or some pre-arranged order to these things that he wasn’t aware of?

Drea decided it for him by asking Aramis if he’d mind her borrowing Corvo again for the evening. Corvo felt his face heat, mortified by the idea of being discussed in such a way--wasn’t such a request offensive? But after thinking it over for a moment, Aramis agreed.

“So long as Corvo wishes it,” he finished, and Corvo suppressed the urge to leave the room. The two both looked at him then, and when Drea saw his warm cheeks, she laughed.

“It....it would suit me fine,” Corvo mumbled, and that was that.

That night, shackled again, she asked for his hands as well as his mouth, and allowed him to rub between her thighs until he was ready to spend. Afterward, Corvo washed himself and went to Aramis again for an hour before retreating to his own room.

The night after that, Corvo went with Aramis, and rode his fingers and cock till he felt raw inside and yet _still_ wanted more. He wanted Drea’s hands around his throat and her scent on his face and Aramis’ cock inside him till he couldn’t think, till the endless calculations in Corvo’s racing mind calmed into nothing but the feel and smell of them.

After a week, Corvo discovered that while Aramis liked to spend his evenings together in quiet companionship, Drea disliked having her time for research and study curtailed for anything short of sex. They spoke during meals, and sometimes she allowed him to walk with her around the neighborhood after work. But otherwise if she wanted Corvo, she would ask. Sometimes twice in a day, as he discovered when she knocked at his door before leaving for the clinic. She left him hard and dizzy with the smell of her, manacles on his bedside table, and he lay in his own bed breathing carefully until his cock calmed again.

After three weeks, they dared to leave the manacles off. That night, after lying back on the bed and guiding every motion of Corvo’s mouth between her legs by pulling on his hair, Drea grabbed the jar of slick from the bedside table.

“Will you let me fuck you too?” she asked, blunt as ever. After staring for probably too long, Corvo nodded. She set the little jar down again with a smile and went to go cut her nails.

Corvo had never before found the logistics of self-maintenance erotic. But then, he’d never before watched a naked woman cut her nails for the purpose of buggering him, either. His erection had flagged after Drea had come, but it hardened again now, resting heavy against his hip.

Her long slender hands felt beautiful on and inside of him. She found the sensitive place in him at once with the first curl of her finger, and kept at it stroke after stroke after stroke, rubbing at his balls with her other hand until his thighs trembled. His knuckles went white with it, and he could do nothing but shiver and dig his heels into the mattress. If she wanted to kill him, he thought, all she would need to do was this. He couldn’t stop her. He could barely breathe.

“Next time,” she purred, three fingers deep up to the third knuckle, “I think I could fit my whole hand in you. Have you ever heard of that?”

He tried to stare at her, but his eyes wouldn’t focus.

“It’s the closest I can get to cutting you open and reaching inside,” she went on. “That way I could feel you all soft and living around me but you’d still be safe.” 

Corvo came, shaking apart like crumbling driftwood in a storm.

Afterward, though, she told him she could feel his prostate was a little enlarged with age and asked if it impeded his ability to piss. That was so like her usual self--and so little like Grim Alex--that fondness overtook him and all Corvo could do was kiss her through his aftershocks, smiling into her mouth.

**

The next day was Drea’s day off. Corvo half-expected her to come find him, but breakfast passed, then lunch, then tea, all without a word from her. Corvo left the house to fence with the Howlers, and when he returned, he couldn’t find Drea in her lab or her rooms. So Corvo went in search for her.

Half an hour later he found her in the back garden, digging in the soil. A potted rose bush sat beside her. Crouching nearby, Corvo waited in silence to see what she would say. Normally her scientific interests stayed consistent, but perhaps a new fixation had taken her?

“I am not interested in sex tonight,” she told him, the words hard-edged and angry. She stabbed the trowel into a hard-packed piece of soil, breaking it up.

“I did not come to you for that,” he told her in return, his confusion and anxiety growing. “I didn’t realize you enjoyed gardening.”

“I don’t,” she bit out. “This isn’t about my enjoyment.” 

Corvo waited for her to offer an explanation. After several minutes of angry digging, she threw the trowel into the hole and covered her face with both hands. She drew several deep breaths, but by the fourth her breathing grew ragged as though she were close to tears.

Shuffling closer, Corvo lay one hand on his sword and the other on her back, tentative and wary. She jerked away from the touch and he withdrew.

“What right do I have,” she gasped, “what right do I have to a peaceful life and a new lover when Meo is--when I--”

 _Ah,_ Corvo thought. _This is about Vasco._ Truth be told, Corvo had expected something like this. The guilt of having that much blood and the death of a lover on one’s hands didn’t ever wear away. Corvo knew that from long experience.

But he still didn’t know what to _say._ He wished Aramis were here. Aramis was good at being kind and saying tender things he believed to be true even if they weren’t.  

“You have as much right as I have,” Corvo said at last, because that, at least, was honest. Really neither of them had any right to a peaceful life, and he would not get to keep this for long. Which meant neither would she. Perhaps she would be happier without the guilt his presence in her life provoked.

One of her hands dropped, and the other wiped at her wet eyes. She grimaced, then blinked blank-faced at the hole she’d dug and the rose bush beside it.

“We had plans to buy a house someday,” Drea murmured. “With a garden. We wanted to plant medicinal herbs, including roses. We always thought it fitting that roses are given for love when rose hips and rose oil are used in--well it doesn’t matter. We wanted to plant roses.”

Corvo nodded, seating himself beside her. The dust would get all over his breeches, but that was fine.

“I’ve been thinking of Meo--Bartholomeus--ever since you and I first touched,” Drea explained, her face haggard and looking older than she usually did. Even the wrinkles around her eyes that showed up when she smiled didn’t age her the way grief did. “He doesn’t even have a grave. His and all the other bodies at Addermire were all incinerated together in the Institute’s furnace and dumped into the ocean.”

Corvo nodded, trying not to imagine Jessamine graveless and anonymous in death. She’d had the benefit of a whole country mourning her and all the wealth of the royal coffers. Vasco had neither.

“I asked Aramis if we could contribute something to Meo’s family,” Drea went on, eyes closed now. “He gave them a handsome sum, because that’s how he is. They almost didn’t accept it--his parents still think Meo is just missing, that he’ll come back someday. I wrote them an anonymous letter telling them he was dead, because how am _I_ supposed to explain how I know? They think I was held prisoner in a different part of Addermire, and the Duke didn’t allow anyone to see me for months. But when I visited the Vascos later, they told me they didn’t believe the letter, that it had to be wrong, and that it was someone being cruel because everyone knew Meo was missing. I haven’t visited much since, I can’t bear it even though I should, because how am I supposed to lie to them and pretend that he’ll come back someday?”

Corvo looked at the sharp thorns of the bush. It wasn’t blooming yet, but there were a few closed buds hidden among the deep green leaves.

He was well aware of how tenacious denial like that could be. Even locked up in Coldridge, even having _seen_ Jessamine’s death himself, his mind still hadn’t been able to accept it for weeks. Part of him had hoped that she had merely passed out from blood loss and gotten treatment after, and so he’d waited for her to come for him in prison, to command the guards to release him so she could take him back to her side. It was only after the torture started in earnest that he had really accepted her death.

When Corvo reached out again with one hand, this time Drea leaned into it, and when Corvo pulled her up against his chest, she allowed it. 

“I thought I could make a little memorial here in the garden,” Drea confessed, fingers curling into the fabric of his vest. “Start with a rose bush. If I don’t kill it through neglect, I thought maybe I could plant some other herbs. So I could come out here and....think of him.”

Corvo nodded against her, and quietly made a note to himself to ask one of the household staff to check every day to see if Drea had watered the plants, and do it for her if she hadn’t.

When Drea pulled away a while later, Corvo left her to her planting. But the next day, he wrote a few letters to find out where the Vasco family lived. Within a week he had the address and paid them a visit.

The family, who included Vasco’s sister as well as his mother and father, lived in the rooms above a small clock shop in Lower Aventa. They welcomed Corvo into the apartment with clear bafflement. But their reaction when Corvo had them all seated and told them that his ‘ongoing investigation into the Crown Killer’ had turned up ‘conclusive evidence that Bartholomeus was one of the victims’ was exactly what he expected. Shock and disbelief on the parents’ faces, resigned acceptance from the sister. Corvo departed quickly, knowing that his further presence would be intrusive. But he left behind Aramis’ address so they could write to him if they had further questions.

A week later, Drea pulled him aside before dinner. She still wore her messy work clothes, and her eyes were bitter and angry.

“I didn’t ask you to pry further into my business,” she told him, and Corvo knew at once that the Vasco family must have contacted her with the ‘news’. Probably at work, since she had slept with him last night and seemed her usual self. “I thought when you stopped digging around in my belongings that you were past this! You went to his _family--”_

 _Well then,_ Corvo thought to himself. _Perhaps this is where it all goes wrong._

“It’s been almost a year,” he told her, standing straight and meeting her eyes. “They didn’t deserve to be left not knowing. And there was no way for you to change it yourself that you hadn’t already tried.”

For several seconds her mouth twisted, and Corvo wondered if she might strike him. But then her lip shook, and a second later her face collapsed. She turned away from him. Her hands flexed at her sides.

“Shit,” she swore. “ _Shit._ I know, and I--I knew you aren’t a man to sit quietly and do nothing, either. I’m....glad they can at least mourn now. Shit.”

Normally Corvo would have approached her. She liked being held when she was upset. But now he kept his distance, and flexed his wrist inside the wrist-bow. If desire didn’t bring out Grim Alex, perhaps anger would? Her shoulders heaved as she panted, deep harsh breaths.

“What am I supposed to do with the guilt?” she asked at last, her voice small. Corvo relaxed, moving closer to her. “Corvo, what am I meant to do?”

Carefully, he laid his palm on her waist. “I don’t know,” he told her. “But if you figure it out, tell me.” 

She responded with the bitter laughter such a remark deserved.

“I should clean myself up for dinner,” she told him, and Corvo knew an excuse to leave when he heard one. He let her get all the way across the room before he called after her. 

“Spend the evening with me and Aramis after dinner. We often read together.”

She looked at him, perhaps surprised by the unprecedented offer. Corvo felt a little embarrassed, but he found Aramis’ company relaxing on evenings he couldn’t think of anything but Emily and Dunwall and the profession he’d been pushed out of. Perhaps she would too?

“I should work,” she told him. “There’s always more research to be done, and so much I owe--” 

“You can’t make up for it no matter what you do,” he told her, and then regretted it at once. It was too bald a statement of fact, and not the sort of thing a normal person would say. Her eyes went wide with shock, and Corvo hastened to try to take it back. “It wasn’t your fault to begin with. And we--care for you,” he fumbled, tripping over the words. He pushed his hands into the pockets of his breeches. A stupid move, an obvious tell.

The silence that followed was unbearable. Terrible. Torturous. But finally she gave a mirthless little laugh.

“Funny how sweet you can be, sometimes,” she said, shaking her head, and then she left.

But that evening she joined him and Aramis in the parlor.

** 

Corvo waited every day for it to fall apart--for Aramis to grow jealous and cast both Corvo and Drea from his home, or for Drea to relapse into Alex and kill both Corvo and Aramis. But one week turned into two, turned into three, turned into a month, and instead it was....easy. When either Drea or Aramis had concerns, they spoke to each other or to Corvo, and he spent his days investigating the Overseers and the mines and his evenings with one or both of his lovers.

Finally, when only two weeks remained before the trip to Dunwall for Emily’s wedding, he returned from a trip to the office of the Vice Overseer and sat down to compose a letter.

 _Emily,_ he began, settling into his chair. The electric lights hummed and ticked, grating on the edges of his thoughts, so he turned them off and pulled the curtains instead, letting the late afternoon sun come in. Then he settled in again, relishing the flow of the ink over the fine paper he reserved for his letters to his daughter.

_Byrne continues to be obstinate. He insists that the things he has heard about Stilton Manor necessitate the involvement of those trained to ‘manage the forbidden and arcane.’ By which he probably means that the Abbey will confiscate the house and burn it down if he has his way._

_But Armando has been very helpful indeed. The recently passed law states that the Grand Guard must have a permit to enter the house of any private citizen. It further requires the Abbey to work in concert with the Guard in any spiritual investigation. Which means that Byrne cannot do as he wishes without a permit. I have paid visits to the local judge and done him several favors he will not soon forget. So Byrne is stuck. It helps that the local Grand Guard officers came up in the force being told stories about me. They have heard of the time I stabbed a man through the family jewels during a fight when I was eighteen. The story has expanded since then, which does me some favors. Most don’t want anything to do with me as a result. It is good to know that at least some of my actions are remembered fondly._

_Aramis has looked into other houses he might buy if this one is investigated. Alexandria agrees that it is a good policy. I do not care about the house so if they wish to move then we will. But I will not let Byrne or anyone else get the better of us. It is not as though the Abbey can fix the problem anyway. I did not tell either Aramis or Alexandria that if Byrne continues to interfere I will make his life unlivable: few of his men will stand up to serious investigation._

_Of the four Howlers recommended to me as fencers I have chosen one. She’s called Polly. The other three Howlers were disgusting louts. But Polly I now see every other day. She is an admirable creature. Last week she stabbed an Overseer and a Grand Guard for harassing a worker at the Batista District’s brothel. With some training, Polly might even be able to best me. I think sometimes about sending her to the capitol to work for you. Perhaps I will. Even if I am selfish and wish her to stay here with_

Before finishing the final phrase, ‘with me,’ Corvo paused and stared at the sentence. He reread it again, and then again.

Living in Karnaca was a _temporary_ escape, nothing more. Yes, he hated the imperial court, he hated politics, he hated being the center of attention that way. He hated the nobility, he hated Dunwall itself for the memories it brought. He’d known this for decades now. He had dreamed about escape for decades, the same as Emily. And being in the city of his childhood again--the food, the weather, the company of people who looked and spoke like him--it was wonderful. A comfort he had never thought to have. No one looked askance at him for the shape of his features or the color of his skin, and the food tasted right in his mouth. And, of course, there was Aramis and Drea, now. Corvo knew himself to be in love with Aramis, and thought he might feel the same for Drea, given time. He rather thought she too might feel it, if she didn’t already.

But Emily and her protection were his real duty, purpose, and place in the world.

Even though she talked about how happy she was that he was settling into Karnaca, she wouldn’t just send him away forever, would she? What else _was_ he, if not her father and protector and guide and teacher? He was _meant_ to be by her side. Time apart had done them both good, perhaps, but a permanent separation....

With yawning horror, the realization consumed Corvo: Emily _meant_ it every time she told him that he could not return to Dunwall. She had never intended to let him return, and not even just to his previous posts, but to being near her at all. The more time passed, the more he could acknowledge that he was getting too old to be the Royal Protector, and he would have wished to give up his role as Spymaster eventually anyway. But she had no reason to let him return, did she? He believed she still loved him to some degree, but....he’d failed her. She had replaced him with better, younger, more capable people who hadn’t allowed her mother to be killed and her kingdom usurped not once but twice. He had put her in a position for the Outsider to come to her and....

He still couldn’t make himself think about it too closely. The fact that she was Marked now instead of him. The fact that she had the attention not only of the whole empire but the Outsider as well. 

What use did she have for a father like him? 

Perhaps the wedding would be the last time he ever saw her. It had been almost half a year spent here in the south, and her absence had been like the ache of a stab wound the entire time. All he could do was ignore it and try desperately to distract himself.

And that was what he’d been doing, wasn’t it? _Distracting_ himself from the real problem, which was that his own daughter had rid herself of him like a pair of worn-out boots. That there was nothing he could do to make amends to the one person in all the world who mattered most. No wonder he had taken up with two lovers at once! What better thing to hold his attention?

The knowledge that all of this--Stilton house, Stilton himself, Hypatia--was nothing more than a distraction galvanized Corvo. He finished the letter, sealing it into one of the metal lock-tubes that apparently Emily used with Stilton, too. She didn’t trust her own father. She hadn’t trusted him for almost a year since the coup. She kept secrets from him when she had never done that before.

Corvo wrote a brief note to Stilton and Hypatia, then packed a small bag for himself with weapons and clothes and toiletries for a few days. With it, he set out for the carriage station and took himself across the city to Upper Aventa.

The Clockwork Mansion loomed prettily over the district. The Guard members stationed at the outpost there greeted Corvo with deference, and their captain wondered aloud why he was here today.  Corvo said nothing, just nodded his head at the gate, waiting for them to open it and allow him through to the Mansion.

When he arrived, the keys he carried admitted him through the front door. He would be alone here until the end of the week, as a housekeeper only came twice monthly to check the locks and the contents of the house. It had been ‘seized by the Crown,’ meaning that Armando had acquired the ownership of it from Jindosh’s unresisting hands and then passed the deeds to Emily herself at her request. She had described the house as a “masterpiece of engineering, and not something that should go to waste.” Having seen it himself already, Corvo agreed.

He needed to be away from Stilton Manor. Clearly living there had allowed him to fall into denial and complacency.  

That evening, he first set out to discover where the whale oil tanks were kept so that the electric devices could be powered if necessary. Then he acquired food from a local restaurant and spent time experimenting with the levers that controlled the rooms. After several hours, he’d uncovered a few caches of money, unusual technology, artifacts, and other valuables, and moved them into a place where he could take them away with him.

He had also established at least twenty ways he could kill himself. Emily would suspect, of course, and probably so would Aramis and Drea, but none of them would have to see the body. The Grand Guard wouldn’t need to call anyone to identify a corpse as distinctive as his, no matter how mangled. And a closed-casket funeral would be better. He didn’t want anyone touching or gawking at his corpse beyond what was absolutely necessary.

It would be after Corvo had returned from the wedding. He would walk Emily down the aisle toward her new life and then depart to end his own--which meant that he would die perhaps two months from now. Two more weeks until Aramis, Drea, and himself departed for Dunwall. A week of travel on one of the big passenger ships. Two weeks in Dunwall. Then the return voyage, another week.

He would get to see his daughter happily married to a politically-advantageous partner he knew she adored. Wyman was nothing short of miraculous, one of the few decent souls churned out by the aristocracy of the Isles. And from Morely, no less, where treasonous whispers still bubbled under the surface. Sweet, soft, gentle Wyman, who loved all the parts of Emily that were the same. They would keep Emily from falling into brutality or despair as Corvo himself had.

Aramis and Drea would miss Corvo. He knew that. But with Drea, her dalliance with him had ensured that she knew she was capable of being with anyone she wished. She believed herself safe at last. Someone else would get the benefit of Corvo’s mistakes with her. She and whoever the man turned out to be could live in peace, untroubled by any resurgence of Grim Alex. And Aramis--Corvo even now worked himself into knots from the fear that Aramis would meet and prefer someone else while with Corvo. So Corvo had no real need to worry that Aramis would be alone after Corvo was gone. At the very least Aramis and Drea had each other. They had been close before he arrived, and would continue to be so after he left.

Corvo pulled the activation levers again, and again, and again, listening to the well-oiled mechanisms click and swish and settle. Perhaps he could rig up the levers to some sort of timer, drug himself into insensibility, and lay down upon the tracks of the shifting walls. That way he wouldn’t even feel it. Using a sleep dart on himself would do the trick. It wasn’t as if he'd have to worry about the hangover the drug inevitably gave.

That concept sparked off an idea, so next day Corvo devoted to contacting the engineering team responsible for maintaining the House. He purposely phrased his questions in a way that made him sound more ignorant than he was, as though he were no more than a spoiled noble looking to inhabit the house and have its mechanisms moving at predetermined hours. He made sure to ask only about the sectors of the house that could be reasonably expected to have a _purpose_ for moving on their own in a pattern: the entryway, the walls around the master bedroom, the exits from the kitchen. That way the theoretical servants whom he told the engineers he planned to hire would know when to deliver his meals or welcome his guests. Those servants could time their movements around those of the house.

He liked reliability, he told the engineers. Regularity. Predictability. They nodded. It was a simple enough concept, they told him in return. The mechanisms could be designed, constructed, tested, and installed by the time Corvo returned from Dunwall.

He delivered the payment the next day, having sold off all the valuables recovered from the Mansion. 

Satisfied that he would no longer be a burden to anyone for much longer, Corvo returned to the Stilton Manor relieved. Both his lovers were curious where he’d been. But the note he’d left behind indicated that his departure had been to manage a matter of some delicacy that had needed his immediate attention. His wording had been designed to imply it was a matter of sedition, something that would undermine the Empire.

In a way, Corvo supposed that he had even been honest. He had let down the Empire too many times. It was only right he remove himself from the picture. This way Emily would have one less weakness. One less way anyone could strike at her--or let her down.


	5. Epilogue

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> CONTENT WARNING: while the last chapter had the really serious depiction of suicidal ideation and intent, this chapter does make mention of it a few times. Mind your needs in reading. 
> 
> But did I mention that this fic is actually a fix-it fic? Because it is. It's a fix-it fic, and there is absolutely a happy ending.

Aramis paced. His hands made another circuit from his pockets to his face, where he chewed at his nails, then to the gold chain of his watch and from there back to his pockets again. 

“I look better in green, Jaime has always said I look better in green, why did I wear blue,” he complained for the third time. “Do I still have time to change, do you think? But no, the green jacket hasn’t been pressed--”

“Aramis,” Drea enunciated, her tone stopping the man in his tracks. “You’ve already met Emily. You’ve been writing to her for almost a year. Why are you acting like this?”

Privately, Corvo thanked her for managing the problem for him. Aramis had been increasingly anxious the last few days of their approach toward and then arrival in Dunwall. They had disembarked from the ship a full four hours earlier than their expected arrival time. Now, waiting in one of the parlors of Dunwall Tower for Emily to be released from a tedious meeting with the trade council members, Aramis--and thus Corvo--was going slowly mad. Corvo remembered how keenly Emily had hated those meetings in particular, so she too was probably champing at the bit.

“Because she’s the Empress!” Aramis cried, shaking his hands for emphasis. He glanced to the side, over toward Corvo, then looked away again just as quickly.  _ Ah, _ Corvo thought.  _ She’s not only the Empress, which is difficult enough for you given your background. She’s also my daughter, and that matters to you now.  _

It occurred to Corvo then, watching Aramis as Drea soothed him, that Aramis had shown signs like this the first month of Corvo living in his house. Corvo had noted it at the time, but as the matter had resolved itself--from Aramis growing used to Corvo’s presence and ways, he supposed--Corvo had subsequently dismissed it. Which meant Aramis must have felt this way about Corvo, too: the Former Royal Protector and Spymaster. A big name in the Empire. 

When Aramis glanced at Corvo again, Corvo patted the seat beside him on the couch. Once Aramis had seated himself on it, Corvo leaned close and pressed a kiss to his cheek. Aramis let out a sigh. He reached for Corvo’s hand, holding it for a moment before letting it go again, in case anyone walked in. 

“I know it’s ridiculous. Her last letter to me was nothing but excitement about getting to see me again--getting to see  _ all _ of us again. But she’s the Empress,” Aramis finished. 

Now they were all here together, Corvo himself felt nothing very much. He had left behind his feelings somewhere in the passage north from Serkonos. Today he noted things with dispassionate detachment. It was a relief that he had finally calmed down, really. The last weeks in Karnaca had been....difficult. Maintaining an appearance of normalcy had been tantamount. 

Then Emily threw the doors open and strode in. The world froze around her, Aramis and Drea blanking into flat nothingness beside the face Corco had loved since it had been small enough to cradle in his hand. Emily’s eyes caught upon Corvo’s face and he stood from the couch, nerveless body moving on autopilot toward her. A moment later Emily was across the room, throwing her arms around his neck, the undeniable weight of her pulling him down into his bones. She smelled so familiar: white-leaf tobacco smoke, her favorite perfume, the expensive wool of her jacket and the leather of her boots. He wrapped her in his arms and held her, feeling the deceptive smallness of her ribcage and waist. People were always willing to underestimate a slender young woman with big eyes. 

“Outsider’s  _ balls _ it’s good to see you again,” she breathed, the profanity forcing a smile onto Corvo’s face. Oaths about the Outsider’s tackle had only grown more alluring to her with the knowledge that the creature himself would hear her utter them. “I missed you so much. I never know how to say it in letters.”

The next few hours passed in a fog of Corvo staring at Emily. Emily shaking hands with Aramis and Drea, Emily showing Corvo the renovations to the palace that had been completed since his departure, Emily abandoning her intended dinner with a Tyvian duchess to host a private supper with just the four of them. 

_ I love every bit of her, _ Corvo thought. He found his eyes falling especially upon her hands, the graceful fingers which had started out so small, her whole fist unable to wrap around his thumb. He remembered the tiny weight of her upon his chest as they had lain together on couches outside Jessamine’s meetings. The Empress could not set aside her duties for motherhood, but she could leave her newborn with the man appointed to keep watch over the royal family. For a while it had been the subject of many political cartoons: Corvo carrying the royal infant in a sling, his pistol removed from its chest holster. Most cartoons about him were cruel or misinformed, but those labeling him 'the Royal Nanny' he had clipped from the papers and kept copies of in the secret room with Jessamine’s other private things. 

Over the next two days, Emily found every opportunity to spend time with him. She told him a hundred things she had forgotten to put in letters, or which were too sensitive to be in print no matter how secure the communication. She delivered all the latest gossip of the capitol in her familiar voice, with her eyes eager on his face and her smaller body next to his, hands warm on his knuckles and shoulder. 

On the third day they sparred together. Corvo could not have been more proud, seeing all the ways she had grown and improved. She had clearly been training in his absence with new fighters and new styles. She disarmed him seven times. 

On the fourth day, secreted away in Aramis’ quarters reading together, a knock came on the chamber door. Corvo got up to answer it, hand on his hip near his sword. 

But it was Emily, smiling at him with a nervous expression, brows all drawn together over her nose. She was starting to have lines there. When had she started to have lines on her face? While he’d been away, sleeping around and living soft?

“If I might borrow him for a couple hours?” she asked Aramis, looking right past Corvo at the other man. Blinking in surprise, Aramis nodded his acceptance, and Emily pulled Corvo away down the halls. 

“What--” he began, concerned that there might be some sort of crisis. 

“I want to take you out on the rooftops,” she told him. Corvo didn’t ask any more questions then. For years he’d silently followed as she escaped from the palace out into the city. He would have done anything she asked, but  _ especially _ joining her in doing this. She had always tried to keep him from knowing of it. 

When they reached the palace balconies, she climbed up on the stone railing and pulled him up after her, wrapping her right arm around his waist and pulling him tight to her side. 

“Allow me,” she told him, and Corvo knew at once what she meant to do. Adrenaline burned through his limbs in a flash. 

With a flick of her hand she did it, pulling them across the gap between rooftops once, twice, again, until Corvo had to look down to know where they were. His heart thundered under his breastbone when she finally let him go and seated herself on the slates of the roof, right beside the building’s warm chimney. Looking around the buildings to get a sense of the neighborhood--and also to calm his poor heart, which still raced from the evidence of his daughter’s witchcraft--Corvo realized they had to be on the third storey of a very expensive bakery. Perhaps that explained the size and heat of the chimney, working all day for the huge ovens.

With shaky legs Corvo lowered himself beside her. He had seen the Mark on her hand but never the powers it gave her. Like and yet unlike his own! He didn’t dare think of everything it meant. 

“So,” he said, and at least his voice was steady. The city crawled along beneath them, the daytime bustle calmed but not eliminated. Emily was nothing but a dark shadow breathing at his side. 

“I, ah. Wanted to get you away from the palace, and from Aramis, in the hopes that you might tell me how you really are,” Emily said, her tone tentative. As though he might refuse her. But then, he supposed, before she’d sent him away, he might have. “It’s strange thinking of you with anyone, I hope you realize, because you’re my father and before this you never....you always seemed above all that?”

“Are you disappointed?” he asked, because she had every right to be. It meant that at least to some degree he’d moved on from Jessamine. 

“No,” she replied at once. “No of course not! It’s just strange thinking of my father having a lover.” She laughed. “Or….two lovers. That’s even stranger.”

Corvo nodded, then realized she might not be able to see it even assuming she was faced his way, and let out a noise of acknowledgement instead. 

“It’s, uh. Strange for me too,” he admitted. “It’s been a long time.”

“But you like them?” Emily pressed. “Both of them?”

To his disgust Corvo felt his face heat up and was grateful that this, at least, she could not possibly see, no matter the powers she now had. Had the Outsider given her the ability to see through walls as well?

“Yes,” Corvo agreed after a brief pause. “I like them both very much.”

“Do you think you’ll marry Hypatia someday?” Emily asked, and Corvo gritted his teeth. The idea had never occurred to him. He’d been planning to either return to Dunwall or be dead. There was no room in that for marriage. 

“I--I don’t know,” he fumbled his answer. “I suppose, if....if I stayed in Karnaca....”

“Yeah, that’s....that’s what I wanted to talk to you about,” she replied, voice going quiet and shy. Corvo stopped breathing, ears ringing. Would she ask him to return to Dunwall? Would she admit at last that Karnaca was to be his permanent exile?

“Every time you write, you ask when I will let you come back,” she began, and Corvo gripped his hands into fists, hiding them in his pockets so he wouldn’t fidget. It kept them warmer, too. He had almost forgotten how cold Dunwall was. “But I want you to be  _ happy _ in Karnaca. Are you not happy there? Your letters seem to imply you are, but then you ask and ask and ask, and I....I don’t know what to make of that.”

“Of course I wish to come back,” he jumped to say as soon as she’d finished speaking. “Never doubt that my place is at your side.”

But she sighed, and the slate roof tiles clicked as she shifted. 

“Maybe it shouldn’t be, though,” she said, and Corvo’s heart stopped. 

He shut his eyes, turning his face down toward his lap. There it was at last. But she went right on as though he weren’t silently dying. 

“Father, you--you’ve been so unhappy for so long. You hate this place, all the people at court. You don’t like any of it any more than I do.”

He couldn’t find the air to disagree. 

“You don’t know what it was like, seeing Delilah turn--” Emily swallowed hard enough that the movement of her throat was audible. “Turn you into stone. I thought she’d killed you! I had no way of knowing if it was reversible or if I’d already watched you die.” She tapped a fingernail against the roof. “I didn’t tell you, but I came back to the throne room later that day. I sat by your side for a few minutes, even though I knew it was stupid and I had to get out of Dunwall as quick as I could, but....I just sat beside you and I cried. I was so scared that you’d died protecting me just like Mother.”

Corvo finally managed to drag in a ragged breath, fighting his own lungs for every bit. His palms and chest ached in a way that the bone charm couldn’t touch, an inescapable pain.

“When I was in Karnaca,” Emily told him, “I kept telling myself: if you manage to find a way to wake him up, if he’s still alive somehow, you’ll make him retire. You’ll keep him safe like he kept you safe, you’ll--”

“I don’t need to be protected,” Corvo managed at last, and  _ damn _ if the words didn’t shaky and weak. _Very convincing,_ he thought bitterly.

“Yes you do!” she burst out. Distantly Corvo hoped that no one was trying to sleep in the room underneath them. “Yes you do,” she repeated in a smaller voice. “You’re my  _ father. _ I love you, and--and if  _ I _ can’t escape Dunwall then I want  _ you _ to get free from this at least. I want--”

“ _I_ don’t want that!” he tried to say, but she ran right over his words, volume rising at this sign of resistance from him. 

“I want it and I’m the damned Empress!” she cried, voice hard. Corvo went silent. Silence was always easy for him, but now it was as though he’d been struck, the words torn out of him. Everything vulnerable about him was exposed to the air. 

“I’ve watched you be unhappy for the last seventeen years,” Emily went on, intensity in every word, “The only times you seemed at all happy were with or about me. When I was younger, I was too naive to see what that meant and it just made me feel special and important because the Royal Protector was such a serious man who only ever smiled around me. But now I’m grown up, I don’t feel special or important because of that anymore. I just feel angry and sad.” Corvo’s nails dug into his palms. “After Karnaca, all I could see was how miserable you were. You’ve been scared  _ all the time _  ever since Mother died, __ and this coup just  made it so much worse!"  Emily’s arms moved as if she were gesturing. “I know it messed you up, everything that happened, of course it did! And you’ve never gotten to rest, or--or heal--and nobody’s loved you but me. And I hate it!” Her voice cracked open on tears he couldn’t see, and Corvo thought that this might well kill him at last. 

“I hate it,” Emily repeated. She slapped against the rooftop with both hands, little thump-thump noises like Corvo’s heart, and several seconds passed in terrible silence. Then, finally, “You sounded  _ happy _ in your letters, but then you were always asking to come back. Were you....are you happy there? Do they....love you?”

Corvo tried to get his voice to work, opening his mouth and drawing in air. It took too long to figure out how to make his tongue form speech. 

“Yes,” he told her at last. It was true, wasn’t it? He had been happy except for the fact that his daughter had sent him away. Yet the fear of honesty galled him lest she take it amiss. “But I....they....they’re not a replacement for you.”

Emily just sighed. “I know.” She reached out, finding his arm and leaning against it. “I know.”

A long quiet followed. A carriage trundled along the street below, one of the horses snorting. Voices filtered from one of the lower floors, or perhaps the building across the street. 

Corvo made himself breathe, deep and slow, and look out over the city. The city where he’d lived for more than three decades but which had never been his home. He imagined what Drea would tell him if she were here, how she’d grab him and make him speak even though he hated it. 

“You're not....wrong. I hate Dunwall. But when I’m not with you I’m always scared for your safety,” he admitted at last. Emily started to speak but he put his palm on her knee, silencing her. “I know I can’t protect you anymore. I couldn’t protect you even before--look what happened. But when I’m away, I can’t even pretend.”

The wind whipped around them. It was early spring and still colder than Karnaca’s winters. 

“But at least there, you’re  _ sometimes _ happy,” Emily said, after having waited for him to go on. “Here, you’re just scared and miserable. And I can't bear that anymore.”

Corvo tried to find a way to deny it, to refute the truth of her words. But he couldn’t. Finally she let out a little laugh. 

“I got you out of Dunwall and within a few months, you found two lovers who clearly adore you!” She shook her head against his shoulder, chuckling to herself. “I’m rarely certain of any of my choices as Empress. But you being with Aramis and Alexandria makes me feel certain that sending you away, at least, was the right choice.”

Corvo thought of the Clockwork Mansion and his plan there. Sitting here with her now, Corvo realized at last that if he killed himself after she had spent so long afraid he was dead, it would be the greatest possible way he could let her down. A final keen betrayal of her trust and hope. 

For a moment he was angry at her for taking the choice away from him, for making him endure his aging body and its weak neediness instead. For forcing him to stay with lovers other than Jessamine. 

And then he let his anger go with a sigh. There was no easy way out for him. There never was. 

“Maybe I could convince the two of them to move here,” Corvo tried, but that only got a snort of derision from Emily. 

“Did you not hear the part where I’m _glad_ at least one of us has escaped from this? I don’t want  _ you _ trapped here, much less either of them!”

There was nothing to say to that. Finally Corvo turned and kissed her hair once, twice, then left his face buried in it. 

“It drives me mad knowing I can’t protect you,” he confessed. She nodded, her hair soft against his mouth and nose. 

“I know. But you taught me to protect myself, which is better.” Her hand squeezed his knee. Corvo tried to let himself believe her but it was so, so difficult. 

“I’m....working on something,” Emily said after a pause. “But when I tell you, I don’t want you to get your hopes up if I can’t make it work. And it will take a long, long time to know if it will work. Many years.”

Corvo waited in silence, knowing that if he allowed her space, she’d move into it if she was ready. A moment later, she did. 

“Please don’t....don’t rely on this, okay? But I’m planning my own overthrow. Kind of.”

Corvo blinked at the skyline, the stars, the city lights. Whatever he’d expected her to say,  _ that _ had not been it. 

“....What?” he choked out.

“In Wei-Ghon, the people vote on a prime minister,” she murmured, her voice quiet and private, just for them. “I met with her recently. And I thought: I can’t be overthrown if the role of Empress is obsolete. Wei-Ghon still has a King and a royal family but they barely have anything to do with ruling. The Prime Minister is the one I actually talk to about matters of trade and law.”

Words abandoned Corvo. She could not possibly be suggesting--surely she didn’t mean--

“I’ve paid people in Morley to start agitating for an empire-wide democracy,” she went on. “Not that Morley ever needs much encouragement to speak out against the Empire and me specifically. But I’ve sent money to a few who seem the most reasonable in their critiques of the way things are now. Secretly, of course! And I’ve started doing the same in Tyvia. Wei-Ghon would speak up on the subject if they thought they could do so without being accused of treason, because democracy has already worked for them.”

“That’s--this is--I don’t even know what this is,” Corvo managed at last, feeling lost at sea. 

“Wyman thinks it’s kind of brilliant,” Emily confided, laughter in her words. “The coups here worked because of the way the _Empire_ works. So what if it didn’t work that way anymore? The people would be safer, because an elected official couldn’t be like Duke Luca or Delilah. And I....I’d be free. Or freer, anyway.”

Corvo found her hand and took it with his own. 

“Tell me what I can do for you,” he offered. It was a terrifying scheme, one that turned everything he’d ever understood on its head, but....If he couldn’t be here with her, he could at least support her in her madcap political machinations.

“Tell Armando about it,” Emily replied at once, like she’d already been thinking about it and had the answer ready. “I can’t write to him about this, I can’t even _allude_ to it in print. Nothing about this can be connected with me. But if  _ you _ tell him, maybe something can happen in Serkonos, too. There have to be plenty of people there who still resent me and want their Duke to have greater power in the Empire, and we can use that. If the Duke of Serkonos can’t be the royal consort, then Serkonans might support a movement that would take power from my hands and put some of it in theirs.”

Sitting here with her, discussing how she could sabotage her own seat of power, Corvo ironically felt that she was _truly_ the Empress. She held her vision for the world and set out to make it real, as she had been afraid to do before. 

They discussed logistics and roadblocks and code-words to use in letters if they dared write about it at all. But finally, the conversation quieted, and into the quiet she asked again: “Are you really happy with them? In Karnaca?”

This time, backside aching from the hard roof and hands numb with cold, Corvo took a deep breath and answered honestly. 

“Yes,” he told her. “They love me, and I love them. If I knew you were safe and could see you more often, I could be happy there.”

She looped her arm through his and squeezed. “So let’s keep me safe.” She let out a snort of amusement. “The Outsider even likes my plan. Well, as much as you can tell he likes anything. He found it amusing several months ago when I found a shrine and talked to him about it. He didn’t show up when I found another shrine a week later, though, so maybe that was his way of showing disapproval? Who knows." They spoke of other things for a while, then, "Meagan--I got a letter from her last week, saying she was coming to Dunwall with someone who needed protecting. She wouldn’t tell me who. I don’t want to see her--it’s complicated with her, after....but if you stay a few days after the wedding, Aramis will get to see her again.”

They sat and talked, a glittering future spread out before them like the city lights.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> IT'S DONE. THIS MONSTER OF A FIC IS DONE. The reception to this double-rarepair fic has been much warmer than I anticipated, since I didn't think anyone would read this at all. Thanks everybody for reading and commenting, those comments are the only reason this thing ever got completed.


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